


The Commando Project

by maneyan



Category: Final Fantasy VII
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Comfort/Angst, F/M, Gen, Military
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-14
Updated: 2014-03-14
Packaged: 2018-01-15 16:45:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 53,758
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1311958
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/maneyan/pseuds/maneyan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>With the fall of Sephiroth at Niebelheim the conclusion was written on the wall. <i>Soldier</i> was a failure. With its operatives going rogue, insane or mutating left and right, Shinra was forced to look for a few option. This option became <i>Commando</i>. Not as flashy and less powerful, they were nevertheless cheaper, more reliable and easier to train. In fact, it had been the prototype team of these elite soldiers who had stopped Sephiroth's rampage. Led by the sergeant who had commanded that team, Cloud Stife, now captain, Commando cut its teeth well as Shinra's top dogs. Yet as time goes by and the terrorist organization Avalance becomes a greater and greater threat, Captain Cloud Strife is confronted with ghosts of the past, ghosts that makes him question his choices in life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The girl turned to look over her shoulder up at him, smiling. Her skin glowed in the light of the moon shining down on the well where they both sat. The night around then was completely silent, only the occasional sound of cicadas could be heard. All around them, the village was asleep, the windows gaping black all of them. It would have seemed threatening, scary, if they both hadn't known well how safe and happy their village was. It was both their cradle, a place they had known all their lives, and the dangers their young minds did know lay beyond its sleepy windows and softly turning windmills.

"Let's make a promise." she said. "If you become famous and I'm ever in a bind, will you come and save me then?" she asked, so merrily, so carelessly. She was completely serious, completely confident that he'd be able to. The boy found himself unable to answer for a while. In the end, however, he could smile back at her.

"Okay." he said and the girl smiled even wider. Scooting over to him, she raised one hand and extended her pinky.

"Promise?" she said and the boy happily did so, hooking his pinky onto hers.

"I promise." he said, smiling wholeheartedly at his childhood friend.

\------xxxxxx------

"I'm sorry mister Strife." the clerk, a withered, lifeless man of the kind you couldn't envision anywhere else but behind his desk, said as he took off his glasses. He looked with a gaze of trained apologeticness at the young man sitting on the other side of his desk. The office they sat in was, with its stark white walls and complete lack of decorations, a bleak place, befitting the paper-pusher. "Your test scores, while impressive, are not sufficient to qualify you for the Soldier program." the young man blinked where, feeling the cold spread in his guts as the realization quickly turned to despair.

"What... what do you mean?" he asked, slowly shaking his head. It seemed impossible for him that such could be the case. The young man knew he had gone through the tests to the utmost of his abilities, done all he could. It could not be so, he could not have failed!

"To qualify for Soldier, one must have scored ninety-five or better in all tests." the man said, clasping his hands on his metal desk as he mechanically rattled off the facts as they were. "Sadly, you fell under this score on four occasions. Not by much, but still. Therefore, you are not qualified."

"Wait... you don't understand." the young man said now, standing up, "I have to qualify for this! I can't have failed, I mustn't have!" there was a tone of desperation in his voice. If the clerk was moved by this he did not show it, merely speaking up again.

"I'm sorry mister Strife, but you did." he said, adding a tone of finality. Mercilessly, he destroyed the young man's dreams. "However." he added quickly, "That doesn't need to be the end for your career. There is another option." The young man had sunken down in his chair now, shaking where he sat.

"Wha... what option?" he asked after a while, burying his face in his hands from desperation.

"Shinra has recently started another project," the clerk told him, "Commando, an elite task force meant to supplement and assist Soldier and Turk operations. The project started just a few weeks ago and the demands are only marginally less stringent. You qualify with good margins for this program, and if it is successful it might very well replace Soldier in the future." The clerk dug around in his drawers now and eventually procured a folder from it. Handing it over to the young man, he smiled at him, a dry smile lacking any warmth and which was given for appearances' sake. "Your scores are still top class, it would be a shame to let such talent go to waste, Shinra would gladly have you."

The young man accepted the folder, staring listlessly at the stark, militaristic design of it and the picture of three men with firearms on the front. With a sigh, he opened it and began to read.

\------xxxxxx------

"A...ahahahahaha!" the silver-haired, tall Soldier laughed maniacally as he time and time again parried his fellow Soldier's sword even as it moved like a blur. "It all makes sense now! Mother, I'm coming for you!" he screamed as the two Soldiers danced across the lower floor of the mansion, gusts of wind whipping up from their movements and making the flames and embers all around them dance furiously. He seemed only barely aware of the fact that there was a man with a giant sword only inches from him, who moved at supernatural speeds trying to defeat him. The dozen, heavily armed, black-clothed troopers standing several meters away, at the entrance to the large, burning mansion, helplessly followed the two with their guns.

"I can't get a clear shot on him!" one of them hissed, a bead of sweat running down his face

"Sir, what do we do?" another man asked, calm yet tense like a bowstring. The sergeant standing at the centre of the group helplessly followed the fight with his eyes. The silver haired man leaped away now, landing on the railing of the upper level of the mansion. The black-haired man was just about to follow when the sergeant yelled.

"Zack!" he screamed, "Manoeuvre Three-four!" the Soldier glanced back at him, understanding and nodding before he too leaped through the air. As he flew through the air the sergeant made a hand sign all of his men instantly changed magazines, exchanging the ones they had for others. Zack swung the blade he carried now and sent it spinning towards his silver-haired opponent, who deflected it almost contemptibly. When Zack came within range, the man gracefully stabbed his long blade into him, three feet of steel burying itself in Zack's gut in one instant. Zack didn't go down however, he only tore to the side, snarling as he grabbed hold of the blade and pushing his opponent against the wall. Helplessly falling to the floor, he nevertheless managed to grip his feet and in the very same instant he had done that a deafening roar broke out from the troopers by the entrance. Their muzzles exploded with light as a stream of bullets shot out against the silver-haired madman, who was unable to move. He screamed in fury at the shock bullets hit him, arcs of lighting beginning to leap over his body for every bullet that hit him.

"Keep on firing!" the sergeant screamed over the roar of automatic fire "Bullets, flashbangs, materia, bring, him, down!" Magazines was emptied and exchanged for fresh such, shock grenades sent flying through the air and detonating right by the silver-haired man, blasts of magic coloured the air and chaos raged inside the burning mansion. The troopers kept up their barrage of fire for over five minutes when they finally ran out of shock bullets. As the smoke cleared, their target became visible, hanging over the railing limply.

"Restrain Sephiroth!" Cloud commanded, taking off his helmet to reveal a blonde, blue-eyed face. "Let's get the hell out of here!" he commanded, the Commando squad obeying instantly. As the mansion fell apart around them, devastated by the intense fight and Sephiroth's madness, the Commandos carried the two Soldiers out just before it came crashing down, Cloud personally holding Zack.

\------xxxxxx------

"Five minutes!" the pilot said and Cloud snapped out of his reverie. Looking up, he found himself looking out over the giant city of Midgar that lay beneath them like a carpet of lights. Yellow, red, green, blue and many other colours were visible. It was a fantastic show of light, from the Shinra tower rising high in the distance behind them and the Mako reactors going in a circle around it. Currently he sat inside a black helicopter flying at high altitude towards one of said reactors. The passenger compartment of the heli was occupied by nine people all in all with him included.

Seven of them were clothed like him,wearing black Shinra Peacekeeper uniforms and combat boots. Heavy kevlar and metal armours covered their bodies, balaclavas covered their heads and helmets with attached multi-spectrum goggles covered their eyes. Pockets lined their clothes along with tool belts, grenades, magazines and other tools filling them. On their backs sword handles stuck up from their sheaths and on the sides of their hips pistol holsters sat. Finally, across their laps heavy, powerful assault rifles lay.

The last man, however, was a bit more unorthodox. He wore an uniform much like theirs, only deep blue and instead of armour and weapons he simply held a giant cleaver sword, as big as him and one foot wide. This man was also the only one whose features could be seen. He had a handsome, open face and spiky black hair combed backwards. His bare arms were muscular, almost brutally so, and showed how he could use the giant sword.

"Bad dream Cloud?!" the swordsman asked with a grin, yelling so he could be heard over the roar of the rotors of the heavy helicopter.

"Memories Zack!" Cloud answered, cracking his neck somewhat. "Niebelheim!" he clarified after a second. Zack flinched a bit at this.

"Yeah, that was the latest time you were in a Mako reactor wasn't it?!" he asked. "Don't worry, we won't have any rouge Soldiers against us this time!"

"We'll have fanatical eco-terrorists!" Cloud answered, looking towards the reactor in the distance. The glowing, green smoke rose slowly from it, almost lazily, a tranquillity to it. It belay what was happening there however. Ten minutes ago the alarm had sounded for him and the rest of Commando, Shinra's elite military force. Avalanche had infiltrated one of the Mako reactors, probably aiming to blowing it up. Within three minutes of the alarm sounding two fire teams led by him had been on the way towards the reactor. To think Heidegger had protested the President's orders to secretly install a secret second security system in all reactors, one that was connected to Commando at all times. He probably looked like a complete tit now. Cloud hoped so, he despised his immediate superior.

"Ain't that a good thing!?" Zack grinned, "You won't have to feel bad when killing them!"

"I don't usually do!" Cloud answered, "It's a job, not a hobby."

"Sixty seconds!" the pilot warned them, Cloud checking his gear one last time. Everything was in place.

"You all know the plan but let's take it one more time." he said over the comm system installed into their helmets. "Alpha team will lock down the elevator, cut the power and make their way down the shaft. Beta team go via the air ducts and rappel down right in front of the main enemy force. If they want to blow the reactor they'll go for the central systems, we trap them on the walkway there. Got it!?" he raised his voice somewhat now, the men answering as one.

"We got you sir!" they answered loudly, in perfect synchronization and with great gusto. Zack grinning.

"So where do I go?" he asked teasingly.

"Wherever you want to," Cloud said dryly. "Don't you do that anyhow?"

"Man that's harsh." Zack said, faux-wincing. Cloud did not dignify it with an answer and the helicopter started to slow down. Eventually it came to a halt above the Mako reactor where the sides of it opened. The walls slid away as ropes fell down from the cranes sitting above the gateways out into the sky. The men moved rapidly, grabbing hold of the ropes and rappelling down from the helicopter down to the Mako reactor. Silently and swiftly they descended. All but Zack, who in a show of his superhuman physique simply leaped down to land with a cat's grace. Cloud was one of the two last men down, the others already having spread out with weapons raised and eyes down the sights as they secured the area. Swiftly and silently they moved, with expert skill evident in every move. Cloud's weapon was raised the instant he hit the ground up, turning his spectral goggles on. His mode of vision changed rapidly from video feed to, in succession, night, electro-magnetic, heat and magic vision. In the end the images came together to produce a composite image of the world around him, complete with a HUD showing his ammunition, his vitals and similar things

"Two men down, by the train station." one of his men said, Cloud looking towards the train station to verify. True enough, two guards lay unmoving on the concrete tiles of the train-station. Making a single gesture, he began to move across the pitch-black roof towards the lit up train station up ahead with one of the fireteams following him. Making another sign, he sent the other team to move towards the exhaust vents and rappel down from there. Cloud leaped down first of all down from the roof, coming out of the shadows like a wraith spawning from the darkness. His men as well as Zack followed equally silently, securing the platform and checking the men's vitals. To Cloud's relief they were both alive. Avalanche had only knocked them out.

"Leave them." he said, they were safe here, as safe as could be really. Medical teams would be on station soon to revive them. Instead, Cloud led his team into the building, Zack right with them. The wide, winding passages of the Mako reactor were silent, empty. Too silent. It gave the whole place a frightening atmosphere, almost an unholy such. Cloud chose to not acknowledge that however, instead he and his team reached the elevator lobby quickly. Stopping by the corner of the entrance to the lobby, he glanced around the corner to see two of the Avalanche terrorists, wearing their trademark brown uniforms. They seemed to be guarding the elevator. There seemed only to be two so there was no need to employ any special tactics. Instead, Cloud stepped around the corner, gun raised, and squeezed away two bursts in rapid succession. The specialized shock rounds hit the terrorists and sent electric shocks through their bodies. With choked cries both of them collapsed, the squad moving up to the elevator and restraining them within seconds.

The technician of his team moved up to the elevator control panel and with his knife he cut it away to start working on the wires. Within moments the elevator was out of order and the doors limply slid open, having lost their electricity. Cloud was the first down the shaft, grabbing hold of the steel wires and sliding down it silently. The cold air rushed past him as he slid down at high speed. Despite being a powerplant there was not one iota of waste heat in the generator, making it cold, almost freezing. The elevator had stopped at the bottom and the Commandos landed silently on it, standing in the darkness with only minute amounts of light coming from the grill in the roof of the elevator itself. Breaking down through the roof and into the inside of the elevator, they got the door open. At the end of the walkway another terrorist stood, guarding a maintenance tunnel. A quick burst of fire, fired the instant the doors slid open, took him down before he even realized they were there. As the man fell down as well they proceeded out onto the walkways of the interior of the generator.

"He was guarding the side entrance." one of the Commandos said as they advanced, scanning for any other hostiles.

"Escape route." Cloud noted. "Jam the door."

"Yes sir." the man hurried up to the door, putting his hand against it and using a burst of his fire materia to melt the metal of the door frame and door together. The group proceeded deeper into the facility, down long staircases and maintenance ladders. In the end, they came to an overhang high above the central generator. Standing on the support beams, they could see the main group of terrorists moving across the walkway below them. If they had thought themselves cramped before, that was no risk now. The chamber was almost overwhelming in size, reaching a hundred meters into the air and even more so below them. A yellow mist stood inside the chamber, illuminated by countless powerful lights. It was clear as day inside, giving them a good idea of just how deep the abyss below the metal grating that served as walkway was.

"Beta team, are you in position?" Cloud said into his comm device as he and his team readied their grappling hooks.

"Affirmative." the voice of Beta team's leader said, "We're right above them." Cloud looked up, seeing a series of small squares forming on his HUD around a group of figures up in the dark.

"Drop flashbangs." he said, "Alpha team, descend!" Cloud and his team leaped off the support beam along with Zack, the latter needing no rappelling equipment to descend safely. They all landed with heavy thuds and instantly dashed forwards across the walkway, seeing how how the figures further ahead turned to face them in shock. However, they also saw the small, black grenades that fell from above down towards them. Shutting their video and sound feed off to protect themselves, they were spared the deafening crack of the flashbangs as they hit all around the terrorists and when the feed turned back on Beta team was rappelling down at top speed from above, landing right in front of them seconds later. The trap was sprung and the terrorists cornered.

"It's over!" Cloud roared, his gun raised and aimed for the terrorists. "You have nowhere to run! Get down on the ground, hands above your heads! Do it now or we will shoot!" Seven terrorists all in all, five of them in uniforms. The two others were a bit more exotic however. First was a giant of a man, black skinned and massively built, with a large gun instead of one hand. He was dressed in a heavy combat vest, cargo pants and boots. The other was standing with her back to the giant so he could only see parts of her. She wore tight black hotpants, boots and a white top and her long hair flowed behind her. What he noticed the most was the gloves however, steel plated combat gloves.

These two could mean trouble, that much he could tell. People who could afford their own style when going into combat like this and even come out of them as these people had done would be good, good enough that their raw power made them juggernauts. He was grateful for Zack's backing now, the man coming up behind him and cracking his neck.

"You heard the man people." he said, balancing his sword on his shoulders. His usual cockiness was in full effect and Cloud could tell the black giant got pissed off. "Or wait, don't." Zack added, grinning wolfishly. "That will be much more fun." the menace in his words rolled off him in waves, powerful enough to paralyse. The black man seemed about to burst a vein sneering at them. Yet, then the sneer turned to a grin.

"Fuck you!" he roared, lifting his gun and unleashing a barrage of bullets against Zack. The Soldier leaped backwards, eye wide as he raised his sword to parry the barrage. He was nevertheless forced backwards and Cloud acted instinctively as did the rest of his men. Yet, before they could, another instinct kicked in. Cloud gazed skywards and screamed.

"Take cover!" he yelled, rolling backwards just in time to avoid a swarm of throwing stars which came flying from the sky, too many of his men not managing to duck in time and ending up hit by several of them each. Cloud first now saw what it was. A young girl, seemingly a few years younger than him, stood on the support beams high above them. She wore clothes similar to the other girl, only different colours and she also had a headband holding her short hair in place. And of course there was also the giant shuriken she held in one hand. What more, she was currently flipping them off. Zack had noticed her too and one quick glance between him and Cloud said all that needed to be said.

Cloud raised his assault rifle and emptied the clip in seconds towards the big man. If he had hoped it'd have an effect he was disappointed however. The bullets all bounced off, equal parts due to his armour and the flashes of magic appearing over his skin where the bullets struck. Still, they did their job. The man stopped his barrage, leaving Zack free, and as Cloud leaped to his feet via a quick spin the Soldier leaped, shooting off into the air, sword raised, as he jumped from support beam to support beam. He headed directly for the young girl, whose eyes widened right before she shot out of the way of Zack's sword as it cleanly cut apart the support beam where she had been standing.

"Here kitty, kitty, kitty." Zack grinned up on the beams as he twirled his sword around, walking towards the girl, who only grinned in return, right before she seemed to almost blur out of existence, appearing behind Zack with her leg swinging to sweep his out from under him. Zack vaulted out of the way however and a furious combat broke out up on the support beams, incredible acrobatics and stunning feats of swordsmanship being displayed.

Down on the walkway, things were uglier, half Cloud's team was down and the other disarmed. The men still standing had taken out their swords however and attacked. For naught, it seemed, as the other woman whose face Cloud still hadn't seen, took them all on, showing herself to be no slouch in acrobatic fighting either, being much more brutal and direct. That left Cloud and the massive gunner. Moving at high speed across the walkway in a semi-circle, Cloud dodged the man's barrage, having to move at top speed to even stay out of the fire. The man was brutal!

A thought flashed by for a split second that they needed to report these people. If Avalanche had fighters like these that was bad news. Still running, he came to a stop at the edge of the platform and only barely managed to erect a magical barrier in front of him. The man's bullets bounced off harmlessly now. He didn't stay there, instead activating another materia. The world seemed to slow down for him and he threw himself out of cover, moving too fast for the man to be able to follow. The terrorist still kept the arm mounted minigun on him but the bullets missed only just, leaving him with room to get in inside the man's guard. It surprised him when a fist came flying at his face, the man was no amateur up close either, but Cloud used the fact that both the man's arms were forwards. In a feat of immense grace, he pushed himself upwards, actually using the man's body for leverage. His knee bit into the man's face, sending him falling backwards and Cloud spinning through the sky. Twisting, he ended up with his body right above the terrorist's and with one last materia activation he switched gravity and momentum around, sending himself flying, elbow first, downwards and into the man's solar plexus with his full weight behind the blow.

The giant cried out in pain, either his endurance nor materia able to deal with that blow and Cloud was on his feet instantly. The other terrorists stared at him after he had downed their apparent leader in shock, a mistake that cost them fatally. Cloud was upon them in a second, taking them all on unarmed. A palm strike disarmed the first and he stepped around her with a spin, the ridge of his hand impacting with her neck just as his foot flew up to kick another of them in the cheek. Dodging, he avoided a spray of gunfire and swept the legs out from under the third. Moving in behind the man to block the others' line of sight, he drove the still airborne terrorist into his two friends with a dual palm strike. With all of them bar the that woman with the metal gloves down, he turned around towards the central generator, pulling out his pistol as he did so in one fluid motion. He came face to face with a grim sight. Each of his surviving men were down and the woman was coming at him at top speed. Not fast enough though and he was just about to pull the trigger when he, for the first time, got a good look on her face. When he did, he froze.

That face, those brown eyes, those eyebrows, that nose. Cloud found himself unable to move, unable to think, unable to accept what he was seeing. As the woman came at him, slamming the pistol out of his hand and sent him flying into the air with a series of brutally powerful punches that dug into his guts, he could only repeat the same trail of thought over and over again. It was Tifa... his childhood friend... the girl for which he had tried to become a Soldier. Yet it couldn't be, she was in Niebelheim still, living happily with her family. Yet it was her... but it couldn't be. Cloud did not even register that he had been thrown off the platform and now pummelled through the air, down towards his death.

It was first after Zack's hand caught his and the resulting powerful jerk as he came to a stop that he snapped back into reality. Looking around, he realized that he was almost a hundred metres below the walkway, Zack currently holding onto a long chain with one hand and him with the other.

"Got you!" Zack yelled. Cloud looking around in shock. What had happened? Tifa!? Cloud looked up, he could see high above how the Avalanche terrorists fled, running towards the exit carrying their wounded comrades. Zack swore when he saw it and looked down on Cloud. "Come on, move damn it!" he yelled, throwing Cloud up towards one of the support beams. Cloud could only barely catch it and his trek back up to the generator was unsteady at best. When they came back to the walkway, over a minute later, the terrorists were long gone and Cloud collapsed onto the walkway, leaving only Zack standing. The captain just sat there, his mind refusing to work again. Even later, when the mop-up crews arrived, he still couldn't think. All that repeated in his head was one question.

Why was Tifa here?

\------xxxxxx------

Hours later, Cloud found himself sitting in his private room inside the towering Shinra skyscraper in the middle of Midgar. His mind was still a jumbled mess. Sitting on his bunk with his back against the wall, he kept his head between his hands. The cold light of the fluorescent lamp above his head shone down, relentlessly, on his wretched form, and his window was a sole square of light almost unnoticeable amongst the giant lights illuminating the Shinra building

Ever since he had entered Commando he had prided himself on being orderly, his room was a perfect example of this. The books in the bookshelf stood lined up alphabetically, the desk was perfectly clean and the pencils in the penholder were sharpened immaculately, the three flowers in the window were groomed and watered an not a speck of dust could be seen anywhere. An orderly mind in an orderly environment was how he he liked to think of it. Yet now, all the order and symmetry in the world couldn't help him deal with the mess inside of his mind.

After getting back from the reactor things had only gotten worse for Cloud. Heidegger, head of the Public Safety Division under which Commando stood, had chewed him out for a good thirty minutes, the large man had roared himself hoarse with rage, telling him in thorough detail what he thought of their grand failure in apprehending the terrorists. While the reactor was still intact the missed opportunity to capture the terrorists was a disaster, it meant that the next time they would be more wary, Commando had revealed itself and failed to accomplish what it was meant to do. Cloud had been inches away from being transferred to a research station on the northern continent for the fiasco.

Even worse, his men had been badly wounded, while none of them would die it would, at least, take them weeks to get back into service. The shame of having his men maimed like that made his soul burn. The worst part, however, had been Zack. The man had cornered Cloud directly after he had left Heidegger's office and asked him straight out what had happened.

"I don't buy that she got the drop on you." he had said frankly. "I saw it, she was far enough away from you that you would have been able to fire that gun easily. What happened?" he had been calm but Cloud knew he was angry. The man, his mentor in many ways, was the last of Shinra's Soldier, the project to create supers oldiers that had ended in a fiasco and been replaced by Commando, less powerful yet more numerous solders. Zack had supported the project wholeheartedly and was like an older brother to all of Commando, considering them all his little brothers. His reproach burned in Cloud. He hadn't been able to answer and had left without a word. Now dawn was approaching and Cloud still hadn't been able to sleep, so tormented he was by what he had seen.

Tifa... why was she with Avalanche? They were terrorists, eco-anarchists who ascribed to a crazy idea about how the Mako reactors "sucked the very life out of the earth" and who would gladly plunge the world into chaos and a dark age to get rid of them. Fanatics motivated by blind religious gospel about some pre-human civilization who had left this world to them to keep. It was an absurd dogma brought about by simple technophobia and resentment of Shinra's position and wealth. He could not believe that Tifa had bought into that nonsense. Yet, she had been there, he had seen that clear as day.

What was he going to do? Cloud couldn't see a way to deal with this. What more, bit by bit another question came up for him. What had he even been doing thus far? He had left his home village to become a Soldier, yet failed in this. He should have returned home, admitted his failure and the shame that came with it, yet he hadn't. He had clung to Commando, hoping that it was good enough...

Good enough for what? He had already gone home once, It was several years ago now, during one of his first missions with Commando. He had been sergeant back then, having been promoted right out of boot camp, and accompanied Zack and Sephiroth, the most legendary of all Soldiers, on the latter's last mission. The mission had been kind of a minor deal, investigate a possible leak in the local reactor, yet to Cloud it had been a nightmare. He had come face to face with Tifa again back then, yet he had hidden it. The helmet had stayed on throughout the mission and he had pretended to be someone else.

When Sephiroth had snapped on that mission and disaster only barely been avoided, he had been all too happy to leave. Dealing with the finest Soldier ever going insane had been a relief comparing to staying there. They had won, Sephiroth had been restrained, taken back to Midgar and now rotted away in prison according to what he had heard. Cloud had earned a commendation for his part in stopping the man and Zack had become his closest and perhaps only true friend. Yet, all that had meant little for him. He still wasn't a Soldier and he hadn't even managed to talk to Tifa. He had thrown himself into his work back then, becoming captain over all of Commando and one of Shinra's top security assets. Yet why?

What did it all matter? The reason he was here was now a terrorist... or was she? Why was he here? Why had he accomplished all this? Cowardice, inability to accept his failure and even to tell Tifa about it... was that what had driven him? He was nothing... a broken wretch living only by running away from his failure, having forgotten why he had set out in the first place. His fingers clenched now, balling his hands into fists as he stared listlessly at the floor.

What was he going to do? How could he go back to work after this? It all was black to Cloud, black and barren. Everything he had accomplished became ashes before him, his aspirations and goals had turned upside down and he was further away from them than he ever had been, feeling like he'd be unable to ever approach them again.

He didn't notice when the door opened, too engrossed in his despair. It was first when someone sat down on the office chair by the desk that he looked up. Zack sat there, sitting with his stomach against the backrest and with his arms folded on top of it. The face of Shinra's single remaining Soldier was severe. Despite their differences, Zack being the sole survivor of the old Soldier project and Cloud the prodigy of the new Commando project, they were close friends. After the fiasco that the Soldier project had been Zack was now a memento of a bygone age. He remained where he was simply because with Shinra closing down the project, he was irreplaceable. While he still was headstrong and followed his own code of honour which he refused to compromise, he was too useful, too valuable, to do away with. His existence was a net profit for Shinra even though he couldn't be totally controlled. From Zack's corner it was their friendship that kept him there, Cloud and Zack were like brothers and whenever Captain Strife was deployed, so was Soldier first class Zack. They were, as it was, Shinra's heaviest hitters and had been that ever since they took down the legendary Sephiroth together. The trials by fire they had gone through had forged them together even tighter, making them true brothers in arms.

"You look like shit." Zack said, leaning his head on his folded arms. "You ready to talk about what happened?" he continued, Cloud looking away. He didn't say anything and after a while Zack sighed before spinning around and opening one of the lockers below the desk. Reaching in behind the dossiers there, he fished out a pair of bottles that stood hidden in there. He uncorked them in his own way, simply with his hands, and held out one to Cloud. "Take it." he said. "You need it."

Cloud only stared at the bottle for a while before he eventually got up and sat down on the bed proper at least before he accepted it. Zack raised the other bottle, clinking it against Cloud's before he took a swig. Cloud didn't move at first, only looked at the bottle. No matter how many times he had said no Zack had insisted he kept the bottles there. It was good beer, finest brewery in the world apparently. At the moment he didn't care. Taking a swig of it himself, he felt the strong taste, and when he lowered the bottle he for the first time in hours could speak.

"I... I don't know." he said hoarsely. "I don't get it... how... but I saw it... What the hell have I been doing up until now?" He put one hand to his forehead. "Everything suddenly feels pointless... I've been wasting my time for all these years..." he was close to tears as it was, his eyes bloodshot and his voice hoarse.

"Did you know that girl?" Zack asked now, carefully, gently. For a while things were silent now. It took time for Cloud to find the words.

"I thought I did..." Cloud answered eventually. "She's the reason I came to Midgar, the reason I try to make the world a safer place... But I failed... and I couldn't..." Cloud buried his face in his folded arms now. He was too enveloped by the shock and despair to be able to act.

"Hey, hey." Zack got off the chair and sat down next to Cloud. Taking hold of Cloud's arm, he pushed Cloud's cheek up. "You know what..." he said, "come with me. I've got something that will help.

"What, a time machine?" Cloud asked, chuckling unsteadily

"Better." Zack said with a small grin. "I promise, come with me now." he got to his feet and half pulled up, half helped Cloud to his feet. Too tired to protest, the Commando captain followed his friend out of the room, down the elevator and out of the Shinra building. Taking one of the trams, the two headed for the lower levels of Midgar, to sector 5.

\------xxxxxx------

Inside the abandoned, dilapidated church the light streamed down through the large hole in the roof, shining directly on a part of the floor where the boards had been torn away to reveal the black soil beneath. In this soil a verdant, beautiful bed of flowers grew, their vitality and vibrancy standing in stark contrast to the barren, ruined building around them. The windows were in many cases broken, the benches were scattered all over the place and piles of dust, dirt or even ceiling lay here and there. It was an abandoned place, a dead place, yet in the middle of it all this fertile patch of almost teeming life could be seen. It was currently tended to by a young girl, who knelt in front of the patch, rummaging through it for dead leaves and such things as she hummed to herself.

The girl was young, in her late teens, and wore a pink dress along with a red jacket. Her brown hair was put up in a long braid that was held together with a red band. At the moment her green eyes were completely focused on the flowers, her petite hands dancing across them with practised ease. After a while she noticed something though. Looking back towards the entrance of the church, she could hear something outside. A smile spread over her face now, a mischievous one, and she got up from the flowerbed, skipping over to the door to hide beside it. She knew well that nobody came here, nobody except for her... and him of course.

The doors opened now, creaking as they did so, and the girl almost giggled. Footsteps could be heard now as someone came into the church, the girl sneaking around the now open door.

"Surprise!" she yelled, throwing herself at the newly arrived person.

Now, usually this ended up as a surprise hug or a playful tussle. What it usually didn't end up with was her being thrown flying through the air like a wet rag and landing flat on her back. It also didn't usually include a fist flying down towards her face. In fact, that usually never happened and the novelty of the situation was underlined by her giving up a surprised shriek just before the fist was stopped mid air by another hand clasping around the wrist of the first one, making a slap echo through the church.

First now the girl could take stock of what happened, her heart pounding as she did so. The man who had thrown her wasn't the one he had been expecting. This guy was a few years younger, perhaps her age, with spiky blonde hair and blue eyes that currently were wide open. His fist was also a few inches from her face. It had been stopped though, a gloved hand had clasped itself around it and stopped it firmly. This hand belonged to a more muscular arm which in turn belonged to a much more familiar person with black hair and a body more stocky and muscular than this first guy, the one with the fist in her face.

The blonde stepped back now, slipping out of Zack's grasp as he recoiled away from her. Meanwhile, Zack knelt by her now, reaching out a hand to her.

"Are you okay?" he asked worriedly, getting that cute little wrinkle on his brow he could get at times.

"Yeah, I'm fine." the girl answered, still a bit frightened by the whole thing. "Umh... sorry I suppose." she said now, grinning sheepishly as she was helped to her feet. She had been told once that usually it was a bad idea to surprise troopers, of whatever kind. Oh well, now she had first-hand experience of it at least "Who's your friend?" she asked as she looked towards him. The guy had recoiled a good five feet away, standing there and looking like an ashamed puppy.

"Oh planet." Zack said with a sigh. "Right." he continued, clapping his hands. "Cloud, this is Aerith," he said, "Aerith, this is Cloud, he works for Shinra, just like me." A workmate huh? Kinda weird, usually Zack kept Shinra's people away from this place, with a stick if he needed. He could be so overprotective at times. This guy looked pretty harmless though, at the moment he looked even miserable. Gee, he must feel embarrassed right now.

"Pleasure to meet you mister Cloud." she said, curtsying with a smile. Oh well, no harm, no foul, right? She'd have to ask him what exact grip that had been by the way. If she could learn it it'd be a fun trick.

"I'm very sorry Miss." Cloud said, bowing to her. "I was startled."

"It's okay." she assured him. "I'm still here, alive and kicking." she raised her hands to show that she indeed was alive.

"I told you you know." Zack murmured to him Aerith rolled her eyes at this.

"Yes, yes, I know." she said, "Do not startle military people, for they are twitchy and easily riled to fights." she mimicked him. "Either way, can I help you with something?" Zack smiled at her.

"Give me a minute." he said, walking up to Cloud. The younger man followed Zack with his eyes and the black-haired man showed him deeper into the church. "Here it is." he told Cloud. "This place is my temple... whenever I'm down this place can always cheer me up. Take your time here, it's strange, but this place does wonders for any funk, trust me." he patted Cloud on the shoulder and Cloud looked around.

"There is something about it..." he said after a while. Sitting down on one of the church benches, he leaned forwards onto his knees, looking at the flowers.

"Take your time." Zack said again, sneaking away from him and up to Aerith. Putting up a finger to his lips, he hushed quietly and pointed at the door outside. Aerith got the hint and followed him outside. They closed the door, as silently as they could, and when it was shut Zack gave up a massive sigh.

"Sorry about that sweetie." he said, smiling wryly as he wrapped his arms around her waist, Aerith returning the embrace by wrapping hers around his neck. Exchanging a kiss with her big, lovable hunk of a boyfriend, Aerith then glanced at the doors. She was still curious about the blonde.

"So, who is your friend?" she asked, leaning her head to the side and smiling coquettishly, "Please tell me?" she added, Zack chuckling now. It was a sad chuckle though and his face became a bit sullen. He took her arm and swung her around, holding her back against his chest.

"He's a captain of Commando." he said. "They're a new Shinra project, meant to replace Soldier."

"So why the funk." Aerith said, nuzzling herself in against him.

"Girl troubles." Zack said. "He joined up due to some girl, I don't know the details."

"Really?" Aerith asked. Wow, what a story... there still were guys like that? Oh well, she still had Zack and no amount of baby blue puppy eyes could replace him. "So.. she left him?" she asked, it seemed like the first option but also the dumbest. Why would you leave a guy like that? Unless he was secretly a mean drunk or something.

"We were on a mission yesterday." Zack said, "Can't tell you the details," of course not, he never could, "But we ran into her there it seems." now Aerith raised her eyebrow

"Oh?" she said, Zack nodding.

"She was on the other side." he added.

"...Owie." Aerith flinched at this. Whoo-whee she could understand that bringing him into a funk. He looked like a sincere guy, the kind that would wait for his girl obediently for years if asked to. She couldn't imagine how much he had to hurt now.

"Yeah..." Zack sighed. "It honestly freaks me out." he said, "The guy's an iceberg usually, cool as a cucumber and professional as can be. But he got totally ruined by this... you don't mind I showed him this place?" he asked now, "I needed to help him somehow."

"Well..." Aerith pursed her lips. "Make it up to me and I'll see what I can do." she spun around in his arms now, coming face to face with him and winking. Zack grinned now.

"I can work with that" he said before he pulled her closer, capturing her lips in another kiss. Aerith squealed now, kissing him back as she did.

Meanwhile, Cloud sat inside the church, looking on the flowerbed and contemplating the recent events. Whatever it was, this place brought him serenity, confidence. Nothing had changed, but there was something else in him now, a feeling that whatever would happen, he could handle it. His accomplishments, for whatever reason he had achieved them still meant something. It almost felt like he really could pick himself up from all this, that his life hadn't ended. Perhaps there was a point to everything after all. The healing effects of this place were strange, yet Cloud was in no place to question it.

Therefore, it became all the more aggravating when it all fell apart. Arguing could be heard outside and Cloud looked up just in time to see the doors be slammed open and Aerith storm in. The girl looked back as she walked, angrily snarling at someone. Cloud stood up now, seeing to his surprise the people following her. First came Zack, but the second person was much more unexpected.

It was one of president Shinra's special agents, the so called Turks. What more, it was Tseng, the leader of them. The man was tall, broad shouldered and had long black hair combed backwards. In the middle of his forehead a black mark sat and as always he wore his suit. To see the man here was a surprise to say the least. Cloud knew for a fact that Tseng only went out into the field if the mission was important enough that failure was absolutely not an option. Yet all of a sudden he was here, in the slums of Midgar.

"I've told you a thousand times!" Aerith snapped as she stormed into the church, "I'm not going anywhere so you can just..."

"I beg you to reconsider!" Tseng said now, pleading with the girl, "Miss Gainsborough, we have strong reasons to believe you might be targeted! We don't know by who or when but there is a genuine threat to you!"

"Oh what?" Aerith sneered, "From anything more than you and your asshole president?!" she asked, walking up to the flower bed. She turned her eyes forward now, coming face to face with Cloud. "Oh." she said now, stopping. The anger ran off her and she got a shocked, shamed look on her face. "S-sorry." she said, realizing what she had stomped in on.

"Please." Tseng said, coming up to her. "What have we ever done to earn this antipathy from...?" Tseng stopped as well when he saw Cloud.

"Is there a problem here sir?" Cloud asked, feeling a seething anger grow inside him. The serenity he had won was ripped apart and the rush of unease and anxiety that came to him made him want to lash out. As it was Tseng was closest at hand, Turk or not. Tseng quickly saluted him however, unknowing of Cloud's sudden anger.

"Sir." he said. Technically, they were equals. The Captain of the Security Department's special task force Commando and the Director of the General Affairs Department's Investigative Sector stood on equal footing rank-wise. In Shinra that usually meant a relatively casual attitude . With the salute just given Tseng was by corporate standards the very definition of polite. Cloud found himself returning the salute despite himself. "And sadly, yes there is." he admitted. "I take it you have made Miss Gainsborough's acquaintance?" he asked.

"Only just now." Cloud said, staying calm despite the sudden surge of antipathy for the man. "What is the problem?" he asked again, watching him with a deceptively calm gaze. Aerith had put some distance between her and Tseng, Zack having come up to her now, trying to calm her down.

"We have reason to believe that miss Gainsborough might be targeted." Tseng said, "Someone has been digging up documents on her. They have broken into census officers, hacked databases. Whoever they are, they're powerful and blunt about it."

"Why?" Cloud asked. "She's a girl living in the slums who grows flowers. Why would anyone target her?" Tseng glanced at Aerith now, eventually looking back at Cloud.

"Technically, this information is on a need to know basis only but I see no reason not to tell you." Tseng began. "She..."

"Oh no you don't!" Aerith snapped, walking up to Tseng and putting a raised finger in his face. "That's got nothing to do with any of this and you know it!"

"I beg to differ miss Gainsborough.." Tseng said, unperturbed. "She..."

"I think you heard her." Zack said now, cutting Tseng off as he walked up to the man locking glares with him. The two black-haired men towered in front of each other, Aerith being but a small slip of a girl between them. "Get out of here, Turk!" Zack added with a growl. Tseng did not waver and met the man's burning glare with an ice cold one of his own. The intensity only built and Cloud could feel that soon it would end in a fight. Yet, right before it exploded, Tseng backed down. The man sighed once again, looking away.

"You are playing a dangerous game mister Fair." he told Zack. There was no threat to his words, only a solemn remark. "We want the same thing, yet you seem intent on making the president reconsider your position."

"Same thing my ass," Zack said. "There's some things the boss won't touch. He'll have to get that, like everyone else does." the man folded his arms and Aerith grabbed onto one of them, blowing Tseng a raspberry in the process. The Turk shook his head.

"I hope you will not have to regret it," he said. "Very well then. Good afternoon miss Gainsborough. Good luck with your flowers." Aerith merely flipped him off and Tseng departed. Cloud looked around now, bitterly thinking that whatever serenity he had gained here was already lost. With a bitter chuckle, he walked past Zack and Aerith both, leaving the church without a word to either of them. Zack called out for him but Cloud didn't even look back. The anger turned more and more into simple restlessness in him. He caught up with Tseng outside.

"Are you heading to the tower?" he asked, Tseng raising an eyebrow.

"I am." he said, "Would you care for a lift?" Cloud nodded and they both walked up to Tseng's vehicle, a sleek, shining black and powerful car that looked out of place in the slums. Cloud noticed dryly the several small time crooks that lay unconscious around the vehicle, having been launched several meters away by the anti-theft system of the vehicle. Getting in, Cloud fastened his seatbelt as Tseng ignited the car and swerved away from the church, towards the roads leading to the higher levels of Midgar.

"As I was saying of miss Gainsborough." he began as they sped along the highway, Cloud raising a hand.

"As you said, need to know basis only" he said as he looked out of the window. "I don't care what or who she is. I don't need to."

"As you wish." Tseng said respectfully. "But if I may... As I understand it there was an altercation at one of the Mako reactors last night, Commando and Avalanche clashed."

"Yes." Cloud said edgily. Tseng was silent for a second before he continued.

"It is merely an offer." he said, "But if you wish, I could look into the Midgar cell of Avalanche. I will not say anything more, what the rumour mill says is best left ignored. Yet... if you wish, the offer stands."

"Twelve bloody hours and the Turks already have collected enough data to make informed guesses." Cloud said, not able to keep all the spite out of his voice. Usually he was impressed by and even valued his colleagues' ability to gather information. Now he hated it. "What's your angle?"

"The continued well-being of Shinra's key assets." Tseng said. "Also..." he added eventually, "miss Gainsborough must not be harmed. Without going into details, losing her would be devastating for not only Shinra, but quite possibly the world. However she's adamant in refusing our protection. You, as her boyfriend's closest friend, could possibly convince her to accept our help."

"Politics." Cloud scoffed still looking out of the window.

"Indeed." Tseng said, "Sadly, some times we all must seek the back entrance to achieve our goals."

"Deal..." Cloud said after a while. The sight of Tifa in the Mako reactor would not leave him alone. What more, Tseng had offered to help him. He couldn't pass this up, he had to know. Why? Why was Tifa with the terrorists? The question burned in him, his own life and decisions irrelevant at the moment. He glanced at Tseng, who met his eyes and respectfully nodded. "But I can only try."

"That is all I ask mister Strife." Tseng told him, "You will have all available information on Avalanche's Midgar cell within forty-eight hours."

"Hmh..." Cloud muttered. Now the journey proceeded in silence, Cloud looking out of the window on the city that rushed past. In daylight Midgar seemed so ugly... a giant behemoth of black metal lying under a dark sky. Like a cancerous lump on the plains, sucking the life out of them and with an inside that would only look even worse. Damn he needed to do something to get his mind off this.

When they arrived at the Shinra headquarters Cloud got out and left Tseng with only a quick hand wave to the man for thanks. He headed directly for the elevators and the third level. Levels three to thirteen were all belonging to Shinra's first and foremost martial force, the Peacekeepers. Where Soldier were singular super soldiers who never had been more numerous than a few dozen and Commando consisted of all in all one hundred men at the moment, the Peacekeepers numbered in the hundreds of thousands. They were the foremost armed force in the world, technologically and tactically superior to all other forces there were and with first rate training. They were the heavy lifters, the body of Shinra's military. If Commando and Soldier were the spearhead, the peacekeepers were the rest of the spear as well as the man holding it.

The man manning the front desk saluted Cloud when he came out of the elevator. Commando and the Peacekeepers had quite a bit of a professional rivalry going on, the latter considering the former glory hounds who got all the credit and the former seeing the latter as simple grunts. The rivalry was mainly constructive however, something Cloud was glad for as he returned the salute.

"Are the training rooms occupied?" he asked.

"Yes sir." the desk jockey said. "Fifth security company are scheduled for close quarters training today."

"Perfect." Cloud said, walking past the man. "Thank you." he added as an afterthought.

Walking through the stark white corridors, Cloud heard his boots pound against the floor with resounding clacks. It wasn't without a certain feeling of confidence that he walked here. There was something about this building, a sense of power, dignity and pride, that comforted him. Even down here, the pride and strength of Shinra was evident and it comforted him, at least somewhat. Opening the doors to the large training hall, Cloud walked in without even slowing down. Inside the large, easily several hundred square meters large and windowless training hall, fifth company were fully occupied with close quarter training. Standing in twos all across the mat-covered floor, they were tearing and beating on each other as they sought to throw their sparring partners to the floor. The training officer stood only a few metres from the entrance and Cloud came up to him first thing he did. Looking to the side, the grizzled man noticed him now.

"Atten-shun!" the man yelled instantly, the sparring troopers across the hallway stopping their sparring and all turning to him to salute. Cloud saluted back, starting to feel a bit hopeful. "We're honoured by you presence sir." the man said."What can fifth security do for you?"

"I'm looking for sparring partners." Cloud said frankly. "Do you have any volunteers? They can work together if they want to."

"Do we have any volunteers?!" the training officer roared now, all the men inside raising their hands almost in synchronisation. A chance to take on and defeat a Commando officer was a juicy prospect indeed. Cloud smiled at himself. Good. One company meant two hundred and fifty men... at the moment his eventual prestige did not matter one rat's ass to him and he took off his boots and stepped out onto the mat. Cracking his knuckles he looked at the training officer.

"When you please." he said, the man nodding.

"Fight!" the man commanded and the Shinra peacekeepers launched themselves at him, Cloud narrowing his eyes and throwing himself to meet them.

\------xxxxxx------

When Zack came back to the Shinra tower the first thing he did was to ask at the front desk for Cloud's whereabouts. The Soldier scoured the lower levels of the tower, asking every person he could get hold of about his friend's location. He flew back and forth throughout the ground floor, asking everyone he could get hold of, from receptionist to the security guards to the janitor. None had seen him however and it wasn't until he reached the third floor that someone could help him.

"Yes sir." the desk jockey told him. "Captain Strife came here about an hour ago, he went to the training rooms." Zack got a cold feeling in his gut at this and hurried past the man, throwing a "thanks!" to him as he ran down the corridor. Worry gnawed in him, after his friend had stormed out of the church Zack had been almost consumed with concern. It had been all he could do to get Aerith home before he had stormed away, heading for the Shinra tower by the next train. People stepped aside when he came running. In his rush, he almost knocked over a young secretary as he ran down the hallway, looking back and yelling a quick "sorry!" after her.

When he got into the training room, he was treated to a macabre sight. Across the mat-covered floor dozens of Shinra peacekeepers lay unconscious, several others either sitting by or leaning against the walls, not one of them seemed unharmed. White-and-red dressed medical teams had entered the room, tending to the men, and just as Zack came in a pair of troopers were carried past him on stretchers. Zack stared at the sight, realizing first after a while that he could see Cloud's blonde head over by one of the drinking fountains that stood along one side of the room. Hurrying up to his friend, Zack saw when he got closer how mauled he looked.

He was beaten and bruised, Zack able to spot half a dozen scrapes and bruises merely on the side of his face that was visible from where he stood. Leaning over the drinking fountain with his arms supporting him, Cloud panted as he splashed water on his face. His clothes were torn and a small stream of blood came from his mouth. Looking up at Zack, Cloud wiped the blood from his busted lip.

"Yes?" he asked, meeting Zack's gaze with one of his eyes swollen shut. Zack found himself unable to answer at first. His friend looked like he had been run over by a damn truck!

"So..." Zack began, not knowing quite what to say. "Do you feel better?" he asked eventually, Cloud nodding.

"Pain and exhaustion does wonders." he said, taking a towel from the hangers on the wall and wiping his face "Do you want to get something to eat?" he continued.

"Sure." Zack said at once, able to tell that his friend was struggling with his depression. He wasn't going to rub it in. Better to have him focused on something else. "Want some materia on that?" he asked, holding up his hand with the soft, yellowish-green glow of healing magic around it.

"No." Cloud said, heading for the exit, Zack falling in beside him. When they passed the training officer Cloud saluted him. "Tell the men they did well. Shinra needs men like them."

"Yes sir!" the man said, returning the salute. Zack raised an eyebrow at this as they headed out of the training room, past another column of medical personnel coming into the room with stretchers, and walked down the hall the other way. Zack glanced at Cloud now, a bit taken aback by his words.

"Shinra needs men like that?" he asked incredulously as they passed by a a pair of clerks, damage assessment accountants it seemed. "You sounded like a propaganda poster back there."

"Not that strange." Cloud said at they reached one of the elevators. Thankfully, someone just had come to their floor and they could get into an elevator instantly. Pushing the button for one of the higher floors, where one of the canteens would be, Cloud elaborated. "It's true isn't it?"

"Yes, I suppose." Zack said as the elevator began to move, the curved glass wall giving them a view over the rooftops of Midgar as the elevator rose. "But I've never heard you talk like that before. You told me once you didn't like the whole bombastic propaganda-schtick. What gives?" Cloud looked out across Midgar, seeing how the elevator rose higher and higher over the rooftops. He leaned forwards, putting his hand against the glass surface.

"Shinra made me who I am." he said after a while, when they had gotten almost ten floors up. "Without them, I'd be nobody. I used to be a simple village kid who got into fights all the time. Now I'm here... I owe them everything." Zack could see how Cloud's hands clenched, his fingers pushing against the surface of the glass as if they wanted to dig into it.

"Cloud..." Zack began, not liking what he was hearing.

"Is it strange?" Cloud asked, turning to look at Zack through his bruises. "That I want to give back to them after all they gave me?" he looked desperate. Zack felt something cold in his guts, it was like listening to Cloud pleading for his life.

"Of course not." he said, starting to pat Cloud on the back but stopped when his friend winced. "Oh shit, sorry." he winced as well, realizing Cloud had to be covered in bruises on the back as well. "But Cloud... think about what that entails, that's all I'm saying. I just... I'd hate to see you do something you'll regret for the rest of your life." A dry, derisive laughter came from Cloud now, the young man's head slumping forwards.

"That seems to be par for the course for me." he said, still chuckling humourlessly. Zack gritted his teeth in equal parts anxiety and frustration. The elevator came to a stop now and Cloud pushed away from the glass, walking out of the elevator with Zack right behind him. A pair of managers recoiled in shock when the Commando Captain and the Soldier First Class came out of the elevator, the former looking like he had been run over by a rampaging herd of oxen. Cloud drew even more wide eyed gazes when he stepped into the large canteen with its shiny floor and metal tables and took a tray from the holder. "Wutai Barbecue, please." he told the chef behind the counter, snapping the man out of his shock-induced stupor. The man hurriedly obliged and handed Cloud a plate of the steaming, spicy food. Zack ordered the same and soon they were both seated by the windows. They ate in silence for a while. Cloud wincing now and then. Zack thought that the cuts inside his mouth couldn't possibly react well to the extremely spicy Wutai cuisine.

"Can I ask you something?" Cloud asked after a while, not showing any real signs of being in the pain he had to be in. Zack only got more and more worried about his friend.

"What?" he asked, determined to keep it cool. Cloud needed him right now.

"When Aerith gets kidnapped, will you go AWOL?" Zack almost dropped his fork now. The tone in Cloud's voice was as relaxed as it could be, but the subject was everything but.

"Oh for the sake of..." Zack felt anger boiling up inside him now. As much as Cloud was his friend, this topic never made him happy. "I dunno what Tseng told you but..." he began, narrowing his eyes in anger.

"He told me nothing," Cloud cut him off, folding his hands in front of him with the fork dangling from his fingers. "I don't care what she is, that was on a need to know basis only. Tseng's many things Zack, but a liar is not one of those things. And if she is kidnapped? What then? You obviously love her, enough to defy Shinra, and if she is kidnapped, what happens then? You'll run off trying to save her no matter what and Shinra will be forced to declare you rogue. If you do, Commando will be on your case. I'd rather not have to kill you." he finished, turning back to his food.

"What's wrong with you!?" Zack asked now. "Look, don't take out your issues on me, I'm trying to help you!"

"Does it vex your divine majesty to have to actually think about the consequences of your actions?" Cloud asked sarcastically, narrowing his eyes and hissing. "Half of Shinra is bending over backwards to please you, and you stick your nose high enough in the air you'll break your neck soon."

"Don't!" Zack snarled. "You're upset, I get it. But you don't stick your nose in something you don't know anything about. What happens to Aerith is none of your business, so butt out!"

"Right." Cloud said, seemingly having calmed down. "So sorry for trying to do my damn job!" he screamed now, standing up and with one shove tearing the table between them away. The steel table went flying through the room and flew into another, empty, table with a loud crash. "You make me sick!" He screamed, shoving up his finger in front of Zack's wide-eyed face; the Soldier was too shocked to speak. "What the hells is this job to you?! To me it's all I have! If I have to I'll kill her..." Cloud ran his hand through his hair in desperation, looking around wide eyed before he turned back to Zack. "I'll kill her because it's my duty! While you think of this as a hobby and run off to make out with your slum girlfriend whenever you can! You even bring me along to rub her in my face!"

"For the love of... calm down Cloud!" Zack hissed, the entire canteen was staring at them now. What the hells was wrong with his friend?!

"No!" Cloud roared, "I drag your obsolete ass along with me on my missions, watch you merrily skip around at your leisure and do whatever you please! While I have to sacrifice everything I hold dear you're so stuck up you're not even accepting the help thrown at your feet to protect what matters to you! You are pathetic!" With that, Cloud turned on his heel and stormed away, shoving an office worker that got in his way to the floor as he exited. Left in his seat was Zack. His lunch currently lay in a heap on the floor along with the plate, tray and even table. In shock, he stared after his friend, understanding first now how deeply troubled the guy was. Zack groaned now, leaning forwards and burying his face in his hands. That bastard Tseng... it had to be him. Zack, however, couldn't even get worked up about whether or not Tseng had messed around with Cloud's head. The weariness that sat in now drained him too much. Cloud snapping like that... This was too much... not Cloud, if this was what it cost then it wasn't worth it any more.

 

\------xxxxxx------  
Squeezing off yet another bullet that hit the target right in the middle and tore it in two, Cloud wondered the hell he was doing. Several hours had passed since his explosion in the canteen and he had currently hidden at the shooting range, knowing full well Zack wouldn't look for him here. Right now he didn't want to have to meet Zack, he didn't know how he'd be able to look him in the eyes.

How could he say those things? He had acted as if Zack had taken him to that church to flaunt his girlfriend in front of him instead of showing him one of his deeply held secrets hoping it could help him. Like his dear friend was an irritating liability during missions rather than the valuable asset and support he actually was. With the clip now emptied, Cloud ejected it and leaned on the small bench in front of him. He was alone in the dedicated shooting range Commando had to themselves, with targets for everything from handguns to sniper rifles.

"Tifa..." he asked to himself, "Why?" the thick earmuffs he wore and the sound of gunfire along the range meant he could barely hear what he said himself. He began to load another clip into his weapon, sliding it slowly into the heavy Commando pistol he had been firing. Commando had their own range of weapons, all of them heavy calibre weapons only they could use. 

Cloud couldn't accept the idea that Tifa was a terrorist. He thought back on life back home in the village, how they had grown up as neighbours and playmates. Working though those old memories, he remembered how Tifa's mother had died when Tifa was... what was it? About eight years old? Yeah... that was it. Tifa had been broken up for a long time, the whole thing had culminating in she and him trying to traverse mount Nibel. Tifa had gotten the idea that if she got across that mountain she could meet her mother again, having misunderstood an old idiom about the mountains.

She had nearly died, Cloud unable to reach her in time when she fell off a cliff, even tumbling after her. What more, when the adults had found them her father had assumed that it was his idea, slapping him across the face and forbidding him from ever seeing Tifa again. The shame and frustration had made Cloud isolate himself. Eventually he had gotten into more and more fights, his feelings of weakness had made him desperate to become stronger and the results had for many years not been pretty.

He could have remained there, becoming the village troublemaker and a petty criminal, but hearing of Sephiroth and Soldier had given him a sense of purpose, a goal to strive for. Out of a sense of obligation to Tifa, the only friend he had by the time he left, he had sworn to get into Soldier and whenever she was in trouble he'd come and save her. Despite her father's demands, Tifa had remained a friend for him, and Cloud couldn't have done anything else but to swear the oath. Even after all that had happened she still saw him as a friend and she was his closest, indeed only friend back then.

And now she was a terrorist...

Cloud put down the gun, gritting his teeth as he leaned on the bench. He couldn't stand the thought, yet in the end it was clear to him. As much as he had his gratitude and debt to Tifa, the one he had to Shinra was ten times as big. They had made him what he was, raised him to a position as one of their key employees. He wasn't weak anymore, he was strong, and it was thanks to Shinra. They were the ones who kept the world going in spite of people like Avalanche wanting to plunge it into darkness. Only yesterday he had stopped an attempt by them to bomb the Mako generator, an attack that would have cost how many lives? With all that coming together... Cloud had his duty, to stop Avalanche and serve Shinra and the people whose lives depended on the company.

Even if that meant that Tifa would become his enemy.

Even if that meant that the next time they met she would die.


	2. Chapter 2

Three days had passed since the clash between Avalanche and Shinra at the Mako generator, three painful, yet resolute days for Cloud. Avalanche had gone into hiding in the slums, leading Shinra's investigators on a merry chase through the eight sectors. The terrorist network was deeply entrenched in the slums, making most of the attempts to smoke them out exercises in futility and Cloud was only getting more and more frustrated. Having committed himself to what he'd have to do, he found the lack of missions vexing, an itch on his consciousness. What more, when a mission finally came, it was an unexpected such.

Cloud was at Commando's training facility, hanging upside down from a support beam in the roof as he worked on doing hanging sit-ups. Sweat ran down his face as he was approaching the hundredth sit-up. It was tough, not the least due to the heavy training vest he was wearing, having added the full hundred extra kilos to it. He grunted as he lifted his body towards the roof, feeling his muscles burn from the strain. Shivering, he managed to bend his body all the way right before the applause came.

Someone was applauding him by the doorway and Cloud let go of the support bream, vaulting mid-air and landing on his feet. Standing up, he saw Tseng's second-in-command stand in the doorway, leaning against the doorframe with his usual cheeky smile on his face. As always his clothes were a mess with his shirt half open and untucked, the goggles resting on his forehead keeping his messy red hair out of his eyes and his posture unable to be more relaxed even if he had been comatose. Cloud nodded towards Reno, acknowledging his presence. The man came swaggering into the gym with a grin.

"Lookin' good there Strife." he said with a grin.

"Thank you." Cloud said cordially. Unlike with Tseng, Cloud had a hard time stomaching Reno. The man was at the same time a lazy, sly punk and an utterly ruthless sadist, competent enough that his position as the second-in-command of the Turks was well earned and cruel enough that he commanded respect despite his fooling around. Nobody was safe from him and nothing was sacred to him. Tseng did as he was told, yet there was still a moral bone in him. Reno was an altogether different story. He didn't only do whatever he was told to do without hesitation, he even enjoyed it. He was a lethal, merciless and indeed psychopathic assassin who loved what he did. Still, it was best to remain on the man's good side.

"Not much for small talk huh?" he said, reaching into his clothes. "Tseng sent me," he said as he pulled out a dossier from it. "I was gonna give you this along with the details of your next mission." the words "Tseng, "give" and "mission" all made Cloud startle. He looked straight at Reno, tearing as much as taken the dossier out of his hand. Cloud opened it and looked on the first side, seeing the words "Investigation of Avalanche's Midgar cell" written in the middle of the page. The dossier was well filled, about thirty pages all in all, and Cloud couldn't wait to go through it. However…

"Mission?" he asked now, looking back at Reno while closing the dossier again. Reno nodded as he folded his arms and leaned against the wall.

"You're going down into the slums." he said, Cloud blinking, "Your pal's Zack's girlfriend has finally accepted Shinra's protection." Reno continued, "Heidegger and the president had a chat about it and they decided to put you on the case."

"Wait, what?" Cloud asked now. "They're putting me on guard duty?" he asked with disbelief. The Captain of Commando, Shinra's elite assault force, on guard duty? What? Reno shrugged.

"Well yeah." he said, "They need someone strong at it and they can't really send Zack can they? She and him would just pork all day long." Cloud shivered in disgust at the man's words. "Oh come on you sissy." Reno chuckled as he pulled out a second dossier from inside his jacket. "Here's the data on that, you're heading out immediately." Cloud accepted the dossier, this one thinner, and dumbly looked down at it. What in the name of everything on this planet was this?

"Okay..." he said, taking off his weight-vest. "I take it the reason why everyone is up in arms about this girl is in here?" he asked. Need to know basis only Tseng had said. Right now Cloud was very curious what the deal with this girl was. Reno raised an eyebrow at this.

"You didn't know already?" he asked. "Damn Cloud, consider having those blinders removed soon. But yeah, it's in there."

"Thank you." Cloud said, "I'll see you." with that, he walked out of the gym, Reno remaining behind. Getting into the shower and dressing, Cloud proceeded to go through the dossier on his way back to his room. Bodyguard duty would require quite the set-up, he was no Turk but Cloud knew that much at least. He'd have to get past the armoury too. Flipping through the dossier, Cloud skimmed through the file on her.

Aerith Gainsborough. 22 years old. Lived with her adoptive mother Elmyra, a widow, in the sector five slums, sold flowers on the surface... Had been monitored by Shinra since her birth... There was a surprise, she was the daughter of professor Gast Faremis, a brilliant former Shinra scientist who had left the company many years ago, and a woman named Ifalna.. Said woman had been one of Gast's research subjects due to her being... Cloud froze now, stopping in his tracks as what he read next almost punched him in the gut. His eyes widened and his mouth fell open, half the contents of the dossier sliding out of it and dropping to the floor as Cloud's grip on it came undone from the shock.

Aerith's mother, Ifalna, was a confirmed Cetra, one of the Ancients, and through that: Aerith as well. Cloud dumbly stared at the text for a good ten seconds before he realized what he was doing. Gathering up the contents of the dossier, he proceeded to walk down the hallway, this time faster. The pieces fell together now and Cloud could hazard a good guess as to what was going on.

Avalanche. Finding a real Cetra would be a boon unlike anything to them. They'd have a figurehead to use as a weapon against Shinra, a propaganda tool of unheard of proportions. Cloud got to his room in minutes, gathering together what he'd need for what he could tell would be a drawn out mission. Any thoughts of it being Zack's girlfriend had gone out of the window, the only thing that mattered now was to make sure she was not taken by Avalanche. If she was... Cloud shivered at the thought.

 

\------xxxxxx------

The way to Aerith's home was confusing to say the least. Due to the chaotic nature of the slums Cloud had ended up walking back and forth for over an hour after getting off the train at the end station. He walked amongst piles of trash, shanty-towns that had seemingly grown out of the debris around them, busy small marketplaces where everything from weapons to jewellery made out of the most exotic things were on display, neon-covered restaurants, brothels, clubs and everything in between. Cloud had to admit to himself that side by side with the bottomless misery down here there was also a vibrancy, a life, a will, that he was in awe of by. These people had created their own society amongst the refuse and litter that had fallen from the platform above their heads.

Of course, with the slums being just that he had already had to fight off several mugging attempts. The suit that up in the Shinra building seemed subdued and modest made him look like a rich man down here. As much as the will and the determination of the people down here had created an unique and vibrant society from the bottom up, so had it also spawned countless vices and criminals. Already he had witnessed robberies, street fights, prostitution, drug dealing and many other things. It worried him that Aerith lived down here, this place was dangerous. It would be a hostile place for any young girl, yet Aerith, an Ancient, was in even greater risk. He thanked his fortunes that Avalanche hadn't found her already, that would have been disastrous.

Damn Zack, it was easy to see that his friend was the reason why Shinra hadn't taken her elsewhere already, by force if needed. Shinra's only remaining Soldier was fiercely protective of what he cared about, Aerith being just one of these examples, and bluntly put, Shinra needed him. If they got rid of him as well it would be impossible to declare the Soldier project anything but a total failure, something Shinra was mildly put unwilling to admit after all the countless millions sunk into the project. Yet would even that shield last in the end now? Cloud honestly didn't know. There was only so far Zack could push Shinra before they'd push back. When they did, Zack would not survive.

He had to stop thinking about these things. There were no Zack at the moment for him, no Tifa or anything such, there was only Aerith and his mission to safeguard her. Speaking of, he should be right by her house. It was only just around this corner. Cloud rounded the last corner, stopping as he got a full view of what lay behind it.

Once again, Cloud found his mind blown by something connected to Aerith Gainsborough. Like the houses he had seen this far, it was built out of scavenged metal plates and plastics as much as anything else. But unlike the dilapidated shacks and shanties, this house was a picturesque cottage, more belonging in his home village than in these slums. The craftsmanship was evident, exquisite care had been put into every last detail, a desire to make this a real home, a good home. Also, right beside the house, on a series of plateaus, a verdant garden of yellow flowers, too beautiful for words, lay. Light seemed to fill the world around it, the flowers almost sparkling in this. Even a small waterfall was streaming down behind the garden, a melodious pouring framing the entire scene.

Cloud found himself stunned and for a while he could only stare at the whole scene. It was so beautiful, the scene was out of this world. For one split-second, Cloud almost found himself believing all the stories Avalanche spread about the Ancients. To see the home of the sole remaining Ancient surrounded by all this beauty, all this life, left a powerful impression on Cloud. He swallowed slowly, feeling a strange sudden burst of anxiety.

Remembering he was supposed to be a professional, Cloud shook his head to clear it and walked up to the door. He knocked on the door and waited patiently, being rewarded about twenty seconds later when the door opened. A middle-aged woman with brown hair with streaks of grey and a wrinkled face appeared in the doorway, looking at him with blue eyes that could freeze an ocean.

"Mrs Elmyra Gainsborough?" Cloud asked with a bow, mindful of his manners. When the woman did not answer he continued ."My name is Cloud Strife, I have been sent to ensure your daughter's safety."

"My daughter has managed her own safety quite well, Shinra thug." the woman told her, her voice even colder than her eyes. "Aerith is in her room on the upper floor." she continued, "Don't try anything." Cloud had expected this yet it did not make it any less unfortunate. He chose to merely bow to her and when she stepped aside he gave her a respectful nod before walking into the house, being mindful to remove his shoes.

The house's inside was as well taken care of as the inside, with sturdy, hand-made furniture and decorations. It reminded him much of his family home back in Nibelheim. Not necessarily in looks or disposition, rather in feeling. Clould could tell that this was a good home. In the main room of the lower floor the large dinner table was the most noticeable feature, covered by a white, embroidered tablecloth and with a large flowerpot in the middle. To his right was a small kitchen and further into the room was the stairs up to the next floor. Cloud made his way up these stairs, hearing them creak a bit under his feet. The upper floor was much more simple, he came up into a small corridor going off in both directions, revealing a few additional doors. The door right to his right when he came up was open, Cloud seeing a familiar brown-haired girl with corkscrew locks and a red ribbon in her ponytail. He knocked on the doorframe of the room, Aerith looking back. The girl's eyes were just as cold, at least initially, then they widened.

"Aah!" she screamed, pointing at him and Cloud almost flew into the air from shock. "It's you!" she continued, Cloud having taken one step back from the fright. After a second he minded himself and bowed again.

"We meet again miss Gains..." Cloud said before he heard the sudden clapping of clogs in the stairs behind him. Mrs Gainsborough came flying up the stairs, a broom in her hands.

"I told you to not try anything, you thug!" she screeched, being upon Cloud in a flurry of swipes with the broom within a second. Cloud had to fend for himself now, backing off in shock as the blows rained down on him. His hands came up and he desperately tried to protect himself, recoiling from the mad old woman's relentless attack.

"Mom, wait!" Aerith intervened now, hurrying out of her room "He didn't do anything!" she said as she tried to stop her mother, "It's Zack's friend!" Elmyra stopped her attacks now, blinking. Cloud had been backed into a corner and now stood there, his hands up to cover his head, wide eyes peering out between the two arms.

"Oh..." she said, her face reddening a bit before she lowered the brush and got down the stairs again, slinking away without a word. Aerith came up to Cloud, an apologetic look on her face.

"I'm so sorry about that." She said, holding up one hand in an apologetic gesture, "Mom isn't happy at all about this."

"Yes... I could kind of tell." Cloud said, lowering his hands and wincing as he felt his head where she had managed to nail him quite well. That would leave a bruise he thought to himself. Aerith smiled awkwardly.

"Yeah..." she said, "It was only because of the idea coming from Zack that she even accepted it to start with. He said he'd get someone he trusted on it. He just didn't say it was you."

"I didn't know myself." Cloud said, brushing off his clothes in an attempt to clean up. "Not until a few hours ago."

"But this is great!" Aerith said, having cheered up. "If you're my bodyguard then we can just forget about it, right? Shinra gets to think they've got me pinned and you get the days off!"

"Uhm..." Cloud began, flummoxed by the girl's words "I don't think it's that easy miss Gainborough."

"Oh don't be so shy!" Aerith said cheerfully. "This is a great chance for you, you can go to Wall Market! They've got bars and hostess clubs there by the dozen! You'll have the time of your life! Heck, you can write off any costs as that you're doing an investigation or something!"

"No." Cloud said now, with enough force to his words that Aerith shut up. "Miss Gainsborough, even though I am Zack's friend I won't fail to do my job. I'm here to be your bodyguard, as I was ordered, and that I will be."

"Oh come on." Aerith began, Cloud cutting her off.

"No." He said firmly, making a dismissive sweep with his hand. Aerith looked at him for a short while before her eyes turned cold and she spun around. Walking into her room, she slammed the door shut and left Cloud standing by the stairs. The blonde Commando sighed now, this would be a long assignment...

\------xxxxxx------

It was in the later parts of the night when Aerith slowly opened her eyes. Lying in her bed, she had pretended to be asleep for the better part of an hour, faking it well enough that when her blonde prison warden, sorry, "bodyguard", had checked on her she had fooled him. Served him right anyhow, she was not going to be confined by anyone. Aerith smiled wryly to herself as she got up and slipped into her clothes. She took great care to not make any noise, guessing that he was probably right outside the door. Quietly opening the window, Aerith slipped out and closed it again before she leaped down to the ground. The young girl was used to moving quietly after all these years in the slums and it would take more than some Shinra lapdog to stop her!

Grinning, Aerith sneaked up into the garden and gathered up the flowers she'd need for today. She and her mother both depended on the money this job made. Sure it was cheap to live down in the slums but money was still necessary. That was why the pink-clothed girl sold flowers in the first place. After about a minute she was done, taking her basket and slipping away towards the train station. All in all, five minutes of soundless activity and the blonde guard dog hadn't even noticed! He'd need to try harder before he'd outsmart her, that was for sure! Aerith giggled as she looked back towards her home, feeling not a little smug over her escape.

"Going somewhere miss Gainsborough?" Aerith nearly leaped out of her skin from fright. Squealing, she turned forwards and saw Cloud stand by a gateway leading towards the train station, he was leaning against the side of the gate with his arms folded. He didn't look the least tired or frazzled, he seemed as though he had waited there for a long time the smug little...! When Aerith calmed down and got her heart-rate back under control she turned angry, defiant. She marched up to him and leaned in, looking him right in the face.

"I'm going topside to sell flowers." She told him defiantly, "And you can't stop me, got it?" She'd kick and scream if she had to, her mother needed the money!

"Got it." Cloud obliged. "Shall we be on our way?" He asked, stepping aside and letting his hands show he'd let her past. Aerith blinked, not expecting this.

"What?" she blurted out.

"To sell flowers," Cloud said, "We should be able to get on the first morning train, it leaves in..." he took a look at his watch. "Fifty minutes, plenty of time."

"Aren't you going to try to stop me?" Aerith asked now, thoroughly weirded out now. What was going on here, she had fully expected a fight to break out or something.

"Why should I?" Cloud asked. "My orders are to protect you miss Gainsborough, not restrain you. You can go wherever you want – almost at least." he added, "Just let me know so I can accompany you."

"Really?" Aerith asked, Cloud nodding. "Oh... okay..." She felt more than a little stupid now. A bit mean too, he was Zack's friend after all and he probably wasn't technically meant to do this. Smiling at him, Aerith took him by the arm and hurried into the gateway towards the train station. "Come on then!" she said with a sunny smile. Cloud was forgiven, 100%, and he was back in nice guy territory again. Aerith now felt a lot better about the day ahead of them, with one of Zack's friends with her this day would be great. Now she could ask so many things that Zack never answered!

\------xxxxxx------

Together they got to the train station within only thirty minutes, something that amazed Aerith. Usually she had to take detours here and there, mostly due to gangsters and the likes harassing her. In the tough slums a young girl selling flowers was high prey. This time that was different, way different, for some reason every last thug and gangster all scampered off the instant they saw Cloud. At times they actually ran in the opposite direction. Aerith found herself glancing up at Cloud now and then. What exactly had her boyfriend's friend been doing? As it was he looked like the very model of innocence with a face showing not the least hints of anything he might have done and that frumpy, blue suit he wore. Really, it was incredibly boring. If he just combed his hair he'd look like an office worker or something. Aerith got a mental picture of Cloud with neatly side-combed hair and reading glasses, an image that made her giggle. Cloud glanced down at her now.

"What?" he asked, Aerith waving her hand.

"No, nothing." She said, choking another set of giggles. No, bad Aerith! It was mean of her to think of the poor guy like that, come up with something cooler. Aerith started running through ideas in her head of a more cool way to think of him. But still, she didn't want to dream about other guys when she had Zack. But if she thought of Cloud and Zack at the same time, that was good, right? Aerith's mind worked for a while now, an errant giggle escaping her during the process.

In the end she got an image in her head, they probably sparred, right? She could see it in front of her, Zack and Cloud swinging their swords at each other in some training hall, sweat running down their faces and their bare, muscular torsos, making their hair stick to their skin. Zack won in the end, disarming Cloud with a quick twist of his sword and sending the sword flying as a gash appeared on his face. But Cloud was a sweet guy, humble, so she could easily see him bow to Zack afterwards before they both got into the shower. There her thoughts got weird. As they both showered, Cloud's wound was still bleeding and Aerith could see Zack coming up to him. Knowing about Cloud's girl problems and Zack's helpfulness, Aerith came to imagine Zack wrapping his arms around his depressed friend from the back, whispering soothing words to him. Cloud, shy, withdrawn little Cloud, flinched a bit at the touch but didn't pull away. Then Zack leaned in, licking the blood off Cloud's chin, Cloud letting out a moan in the process... Aerith had to stop there, reaching up to cover her nose as the blood began to drip from it.

"Are you okay?" Cloud asked beside her now, noticing her as she fumbled for a tissue. Aerith accidentally glanced up at him when he said this and instantly blushed as she met his concerned, baby-blue eyes. She hurriedly looked away. Bad Aerith! Don't think of Zack's friends like that! Cloud offered her a tissue and Aerith gratefully accepted it, wiping up the blood and plugging her nose in case any more came out. They were by the train station now, the train slowly rolling into the station from the distance. "Miss Gainsborough," Cloud began now. "Did something happen?"

"No, no, no." Aerith said hurriedly, "Nothing at all, I'm just fine." She did not want to talk about what she just had been thinking of.

"Are you sure?" Cloud asked now.

"Yeah!" she said, "Just, you know, a random nosebleed. You don't ever get random nosebleeds?" she asked, Cloud shaking his head.

"No not really..." Cloud confessed, looking at her with a look on his face like he was utterly perplexed by her. Way to go Aerith, way to make him think you were a weirdo. Topic switch, topic switch. They were at the station now, along with the crowd of early morning commuters going to their jobs topside, the doors opened in front of them and they all started moving.

"But hey," she asked him as they went aboard the train. "Where are you from originally? What sector?" the blood had stopped now and she had managed to wipe most of it away. She tucked away the tissue, thinking she might need it later, and turned to look at Cloud properly now. She tried to ignore the small thought in the back of her head that consisted of him, steaming showers and her boyfriend. Cloud sat down beside her on the green, plastic benches and leaned backwards.

"None actually." He said as the doors closed and the train began to move, "I'm a country boy originally."

"Really?" Aerith asked, eager. If he was from the same village as Zack she would have struck gold!

"Yes." Cloud said, "A small village called Niebelheim." Aerith felt a small sting of disappointment now. Zack was from another village. Oh well, might as well keep listening.

"What's it like?" she asked.

"Well..." Cloud said, smiling wryly for the first time that Aerith had seen. "It's got a mako reactor." He said it in a way that made Aerith wonder if there was something she had missed. "To us "backwater experts" as Zack called it that means one thing." He continued.

"What is that?" Aerith asked, her curiosity piqued.

"Nothing else out there." Cloud chuckled, Aerith unable to stop herself from giving up a small giggle as well. "And that... is pretty much the long and short of it." Cloud said. "I left it when I was young, coming to Midgar to try out for Soldier."

"But, Zack said you weren't Soldier." Aerith said, Cloud looking at her now. He smiled, but Aerith could see the pain in his eyes.

"I'm not." He said frankly, "I wasn't good enough, didn't measure up. Commando was the best I could achieve."

"Sorry." Aerith said again now. He looked so sad, like a little puppy. Aerith just wanted to pick him up and hug him to comfort him. She made the call right there to help him get him a girl of some sort. He needed it, a girl that could put a smile on his lips. Said girl would also have the second cutest guy in Midgar all to herself, shouldn't be too hard to get it done really.

"No, no." Cloud said quickly, "It's not your fault. I just had a kind of painful wakeup call recently." Aerith glanced at him. She got a little anxious now but asked the question that never the less was on her mind.

"Is it about a girl?" she asked gently, Cloud looking up at her. Surprise could be seen on his face "Zack told me." Aerith explained, "But that was everything he told me." She quickly told him, "Nothing more than that." Cloud leaned his head backwards, looking up at the roof.

"Yes," he said eventually, "You could say that."

"Do you want to talk about it?" Aerith asked now. She didn't like to see him hurt, Zack's friend was too sweet to have to look like a kicked puppy. Cloud shook his head, smiling now.

"Thank you, but I'm all right." He told her, "It's kind of a big thing, but I can solve it on my own. I have to." He sat up straight now. "Lets not get caught up in my personal problems now." He added with a bit more cheer in his voice.

"Okay!" Aerith agreed, "If you don't mind, can you tell me a bit about Commando? I know about Soldier, but Commando is a new one for me." Cloud nodded.

"It is for many people." He said. "Shinra hasn't been as open about it as with Soldier, you usually only hear about it when you're a potential recruit."

"Well when was it started, why?" Aerith asked.

"Six, seven years ago now." Cloud said, "The idea was that while first class Soldiers usually swept away everything in their path you still could use some decent support. The Turks have other things to do than aid Soldier."

"Who's the Turks?" Aerith asked.

"Remember Tseng?" Cloud answered and Aerith nodded, "He's one of them. They are Shinra's special agents, their primary role used to be to find candidates for Soldier, now they mainly do dirty work like assassinations and the likes."

"Uh-huh." Aerith said, listening attentively.

"Yes, and since both Soldier and the Turks had a need for support that could keep up, something the regular peacekeepers often can't, they decided to try a small scale experiment. They take the best of the regular peacekeepers and up the training, the equipment, the tactics and so on tenfold. You also give them some basic mako enhancement. The result is a normal trooper that can never the less keep up with Soldier"

"You're mako-enhanced?" Aerith asked and Cloud nodded.. "But your eyes don't glow, not like Zack's."

"It's not enough for that." Cloud said, "One ten man squad of Commando troopers gets about the same amount of mako put into them as one Soldier gets."

"Okay, so it's a kind of cheaper variant of Soldier?" Aerith asked. "No offence." She added hastily. Cloud shook his head.

"Not quite." He said, "Let me put it this way, in battle there's always a lot of things that decide the outcome, there's your skill, whether there's many against one, your knowledge of the surroundings, how good equipment you have and so on. Soldier was a project that wanted to raise the skill and raw power of a single person to the level that all those other factors became pointless. Commando, on the other hand, is about trying to use all factors as one, gain the most improved performance for the least amount of money."

"So who would win in a fight between you and Zack then?" Aerith asked, Cloud smiling wryly.

"Him." He said without even a second of hesitation. "He's too good, a juggernaut. With that sword of his he can slice a tank in two if he wants to. But give me a squad and some time to set up and then it's not that easy. My men and I have a roughly fifty-fifty win-loss ratio against him during training."

"Really?" She asked and Cloud nodded. Right then, the lamps inside the train carriage began to shine red.

"A checkpoint." Cloud noted, Aerith's eyes opening wide.

"Oh snap..." she said, remembering something. "I didn't get my ID." She had hardly finished her sentence when the lamps began to blink red.

"Alert, alert." a robotic voice said, "Passenger without ID detected in cart five." Aerith was on her feet in half a second, the girl ready to run if needed. Cloud grabbed hold of her however.

"Wait." he said, "Let me handle this." Aerith looked back at him, Cloud nodding with a comforting expression on his face. In the end, the girl sat down, albeit stiffly. Soon enough the doors slip open to the carriage and two red-clothed security guards entered the room.

"IDs people!" one of them yelled, the other passengers digging through their pockets now for their ID badges. The two guards moved down the cart, checking each of the people present and Aerith only seemed more and more anxious to closer they came. In the end, when they reached her, she looked away and the two guards instantly picked up on it.

"So where's your ID sweetie?" one of them leered, leaning in towards her. "Can't ride the train without one."

"Will this do?" Cloud asked, holding out a card towards them. The guards initially looked angry at having been interrupted but then they took a closer look on the card. Both of them turned pale when they saw it and snapped to attention instantly.

"Sir!" one of them croaked with a stiff salute, Cloud returning it.

"This young woman is with me." he said, "I can vouch for her credibility." The guards flinched at this, exchanging a quick, worried look.

"Begging your pardon sir." one of them said, "But the rules say that anyone riding without ID has to be..."

"You do you you must." Cloud said, leaning back in his seat and balancing one leg across his knee. "And I do what I must. I am under orders to protect her from any and all threats. If you want to challenge a Commando officer in the line of duty then all the more honour to you. But you won't survive." He spoke calmly, almost gently, and the guards stiffened at this. One of them looked outright queasy at the thought of fighting Cloud.

"We'll just write it up to scratched badge" one of them said, digging out his notebook and making a quick note in it, smiling forcedly at Cloud. Aerith couldn't help but notice how they seemed to almost tremble. "Have a good day." With that, both guards vacated the cart in seconds. Aerith looked after them both in shock, however after a while she began to giggle. Unable to stop herself, she bent forwards as she clutched her stomach, giggling so hard that she shook. It took her a good minute to recover and when she looked up at Cloud she met his confused gaze for one second before she burst out into giggles again. In the end she could recover somewhat, take a deep breath and sit up properly again. Looking towards Cloud, she smiled widely at him.

"I've never seen a guard run that fast before." she giggled, "It's like they had a dragon right behind them. You're quite handy to have around you know."

"Just doing my job miss Gainsborough."

"Hey just call me Aerith." Aerith said now, "I mean, "mister Strife" sounds like the bad guy out of some kids' book, doesn't it? And it's not fair if you have to call me miss Gainsborough, that makes me sound like an old lady anyhow. Okay?" Cloud blinked at this, not having followed Aerith's mental train of thought completely at first.

"Okay then miss Aerith." he said, Aerith shaking her head.

"No, no, no, no." she said, "Just Aerith. Come on, you can do it!" Cloud got a bit of an awkward look on his face at this but Aerith was determined. She was going to bend that stiff façade away, one way or another. Project "loosen up Zack's friend" had commenced and she wouldn't stop before he was thoroughly loosened up... did that sound dirty? Either way, she could tell that the guy behind that facade would be a ten out of ten sweet guy who at the same time was almost cute as could be. She wasn't personally into blonde, wiry boys like him but knew many were. Cloud smiled now, a bit awkwardly, yet still honestly.

"Aerith." he said, a bit uncertainly but still. Aerith grinned mentally. He wouldn't know what hit him, when she was done girls would swarm him. She got an image in her head of Cloud sitting on a sofa, arms spread wide and a confident smirk on his face along with a pair of sunglasses. And around him several young pretty girls were sitting, adoring looks on their faces. Glancing up at Cloud and see him sit there, leaning backwards with his left ankle resting on his right knee. Yep. It could and would happen. Their train came to a halt now by the station where she usually got off. Aerith skipped to her feet and left the train, Cloud following her.

\------xxxxxx------

Cloud yawned, hiding his mouth with the back of his hand. After several hours the sun had risen as high above Midgar as it would, however little that meant these days. It was still quite dark, the light of the sun being blotted out by the heavy clouds above them. The lights that were came just as much from the many neon and street lights around them. And to one small extent, from Aerith as well. Cloud didn't know what it was, but there was something to the girl. In her movements, in her smile, there was an element of sheer... vitality. Sheer life. The world seemed to get a little bit brighter around her. The people she managed to sell some flowers to seemed to get a little bit more cheered up. Cloud didn't know what it was, if it was some trick of light, his mind playing tricks on him due to the girl's personality or if it was an actual aura of light around her, courtesy of her heritage. He was in favour of the second option as it was.

As Aerith stood by the street crossing, cheerily asking everyone passing by if they wanted some flowers, Cloud were a few meters away, sitting by an outdoors café with a cup of coffee in front of him and pretending to be reading a newspaper. He didn't lack for things to do however, his mind was fully occupied, thinking of all the stories he had heard about the Ancients, the Cetra.

Little was known of them, what was known was mostly legends. They were said to have been a people living at the dawn of time, before the first human settlements. As humanity spread they had vanished, only stories remaining in the end. They were said to have a deep connection to the planet, being able to imbue life into it. There was something else to the myths too, a story about a promised land only they knew the way to, a land connected to their very being. This place was supposedly a paradise, a place of verdant gardens and endless happiness. Cloud didn't know if those legends were true, only that if they were, Aerith might be one of the single most important people alive today. And knowing all these things, it was easy to see where exactly his mind could play tricks on him.

Cloud noticed that Aerith was looking at him now, her lips pursed and her thumb and index finger running down her jawline. She seemed to be thinking of something and after a while she motioned for him to come over. Cloud looked around, perplexed, before he came up to her.

"You see those girls across the street?" Aerith asked, Cloud looking up. Yes, there were a group of girls sitting at the other end of the outdoor café. They were hunched over, almost hiding behind the fence in front, and when they saw that he was looking at them they quickly looked way.

"What about them?" Cloud asked, wondering what she was getting at.

"They've been sitting there for half an hour and they've hardly even drunken any of their tea!" Aerith said, "They've been too busy ogling you."

"Okay..." Cloud began, "Do you want to find another place?" he asked her, Aerith rolling her eyes.

"No you doofus." she said, "Here." she tore up a bouquet from the basket she was carrying. "Here, go get them. Use these. Come on!" With that, she nearly shoved him towards the girls, right out into the street. There were hardly any traffic though, meaning that there was no risk to him. Cloud looked back at her and Aerith motioned for him to move, an encouraging look on her face. Cloud looked down at the bouquet and sighed. Oh well, he'd have to keep an eye at her though, he figured that he could at least give it a shot. Putting on a smile, he walked over to the café.

Aerith giggled from her position. As awkward as he was, not even he could mess that up. With some flowers and girls that already had been smitten by him Cloud would have a walk in the park. with them. She looked the other way now, planning to give him some privacy, yet only a minute later he came back again, the bouquet no longer in hand. Instead, he held ten gil in it which he handed to her.

"There." he said, "One gil per flower, right?" Aerith blinked. What in the... okay stop, cease and desist now. What? Had he...

"What?" she asked, "No, you don't get it! You had a perfect chance there!"

"To what?" Cloud asked, folding his arms as that serious look settled on his face, "You do remember I'm here because it's my job to look after you, right?"

"Yes, but... ugh!" Aerith gave up. What a blockhead. "You could have at least gotten a number or something!" she told him, Cloud looking dryly at her.

"I don't "get numbers" during work hours." Aerith sighed. This guy would need some more work, that was painfully obvious right now. All work and no play. She found herself grateful for Zack's playfulness. This guy was dry as the desert in comparison. Okay, one thing at a time... Aerith took the money from him and began to think. She'd have to start in the other end it seemed... what to do...

Meanwhile, Cloud was himself deep in thought. Knowing what Aerith was, he had now become somewhat wary of her. Who knew what dwelt in her mind. As a Cetra, a being to be connected to the planet itself, there was no way of knowing what she thought of. Did she feel the very pulse of the world beneath her feet? He wondered how much she knew. Was she fully aware of her heritage? Was she perhaps unaware? Perhaps her flower selling was a sub-conscious choice of work, that she answered to a need to spread life around herself? She did call Elmyra "mom" despite the woman not being it, did that mean anything? She did seem still intent of trying to trick him away from her. It hadn't been that subtle, but it could have worked. The mood between them was relaxed, familiar, and in other situations he could have thought of it only as a friend helping him to date. Zack sure would have approved of that method. Yet as it was... he did not know and it unsettled him.

\------xxxxxx------

The day continued without any more incidents. However Aerith had after her initial sulk realized just how useful the blonde watching her was and to his exasperation Cloud more and more was dragged into the flower business, hawking flowers to any girl between fifteen and thirty-five that passed him by. And Aerith kept score as well, Cloud found every last move he made graded by the girl, his smiles, his words, his attitude, and she had opinions on it all. Bit by bit Aerith edited his selling technique, in the end Cloud was acting like what to him only came across as a massive clown. However judging from Aerith's assurances and the actions of the girls/ladies he targeted it seemed to work. The day became a long one though, when the clock started approaching seven and Aerith had run out of flowers Cloud was exhausted to say the least.

On the train ride home Cloud was exhausted, he half lay in his seat, fighting sleep as Aerith sat behind him, counting the money she had made with an almost blissful look on her face.

"This has to be by best day ever!" she gushed, "if I can make money like this... You're gonna stay long, right? If you can keep that performance up I can get a new cart soon!" she squealed with almost childish delight. People around them noticed the girl quite clearly, one way or another the sight of the gushing girl and the exhausted young man made quite a few people curious. The man sitting beside Cloud leaned in after a while, quietly asking Cloud what exactly they had been doing to get that much money. Cloud dryly chuckled.

"Flowers." he said, nodding when the man got a suspicious look on his face. "Yes, flowers."

"Is that... a metaphor?" the man asked carefully. Cloud looked at the man now. He was half wishing him to be some thug or something. Then he would get away with beating him. However the man, with neatly combed hair and a red suit and briefcase, was nowhere near a thug. Cloud chose to only shake his head. The man looked a bit disappointed at this actually, glancing one last time at Aerith. Cloud narrowed his eyes and opened his jacket a bit to show the pistol hidden there. The man's eyes turned wide before he looked away, making a point out of not looking at them for the rest of the journey. Cloud snorted in disgust. What a thought... the last of the Ancients prostituting herself? That would be the day...

\------xxxxxx------

As they got back to the end station down in the slums Aerith almost skipped out of the train and Cloud was right behind her. Looking up at the giant platform hanging over their heads, Cloud considered the day that had passed. Had this been Aerith's day life? Coming up to the surface during the days and then retreating down into the darkness when the day was over? It felt like such an ignoble existence for one of the Ancients. If Shinra could take her in properly she wouldn't have to suffer this. Cloud didn't know but could guess that the president gladly would spend millions to ensure her comfort and safety if needed. He was a man for spending to solve problems. For the last of the Ancients... Cloud could imagine her getting an entire floor of the Shinra building to herself, being allowed to fill it with plants of all kinds, the president could fly in specimens from around the world if needed. That really wasn't an impossible thought, Cloud knew just how great Shinra's revenues were and how much the president liked spending on unique projects. Yet, she remained down here, in the dirt. People like him had abandoned everything to gain a position with Shinra, yet Aerith seemed quite pleased with remaining where she was.

When they got back to Aerith's house night had already started to fall. Even down here in the slums there were some sense of the passages of day and night, meaning that the garden had sunken into a deep blue, soft light. Aerith practically stormed into the house, still overjoyed, and when Cloud got in he saw how Aerith had thrown herself in her mother's arms, hugging her fiercely.

"Look mom!" she said with her eyes sparkling. "Look how much money we made!" Elmyra had been standing by the stove and been surprised by her daughter's enthusiastic return. However when she took the wad of bills from Aerith she gasped when seeing how much it was.

"This... this is almost twice what you usually make!" she stated in awe.

"I know!" Aerith squealed. "And it's all thanks to Cloud!" Aerith turned around and grabbed Cloud by the wrist to drag him inside. "Come on Cloud, show mom what I taught you!"

"Oh please no..." Cloud groaned, "It's way too late for that."

"Oh pleeease," Aerith begged, clasping her hands in a begging motion. Cloud sighed deeply, looking miserable

"Fine." he said, Aerith making a triumphant hand gesture and quickly snatched a flower out of the flowerpot on the table.

"Come on." she said, "Mom, you're his customer now, okay?" Cloud felt outright miserable but did as commanded, putting on the smile he had been drilled in using. Leaning in somewhat, he held out the flower in his hand, holding it gently as he could.

"I hope I'm not a nuisance miss" he said with a voice like honey. "but I just have to tell something" He gently put it in Elmyra's hand, the woman only staring at him. "Yes, that flower suits you perfectly." he said, leaning back and getting a pensive look on his face. "Shall we say one gil?" Cloud, "for a pretty woman like you it's perfect."

Elmyra stared at him, the middle aged woman having something stiff in her face for a second before she spun around, putting the flower away and focusing on dinner.

"Dinner will be done in a short while." she said tersely, "go wash up and we can eat when you get back." Aerith clutched her hands in front of her mouth, doing her best to not giggle, and Cloud grimaced, he hated doing it still. So cheesy. The girl slipped off towards the stairs and Cloud got uncertain for a second. Yet, he could leave her alone for a few minutes. Walking towards the door, Cloud planned to head for the wall market and get something to eat. Elmyra stopped him however.

"That means you too mister Strife." she told him. "You're here to stay so I can at least feed you considering all your help today." Cloud stopped in the doorway and looked back. He was surprised by never the less obliged, bowing in gratitude to her before walking up the stairs himself. The older woman's sudden acceptance did surprise him but he didn't question it. Instead, he washed up, just like Aerith, and a few minutes later they were all seated at the table. Cloud found to his delight that Elmyra was quite the competent cook. While the food was much more plain than the stuff he ate at the Shinra headquarters it was by no means bad, quite the opposite in fact. Cloud was not hard for Aerith to convince to another helping of it.

\------xxxxxx------

The evening passed quietly without any incidents and several hours had passed when Cloud was sitting alone by the table. The night was pitch black and he had only a single candle to give him light for his work. He sat leaning over the table as he looked through the dossier Tseng had given him on Avalanche. Slowly turning the pages, he reviewed the data on the Midgar section of the single biggest terrorist organisation in the world.

It was surprisingly informative, the Turks knew a lot about Avalanche. Equipment, rough estimates of their numbers, tactics, schematics of the kind of home-made explosives and devices they used. Yet, when it came to the actual people it was sadly lacking. There were some data on their leader, the massive black man Cloud had fought at the mako generator. His name was Barret Wallace, a former miner from Corel who once had cooperated with Shinra when building the Mako reactor there only to turn on them later, destroying the generator. The town of Corel followed it into oblivion in the fighting that took place after that. The man had disappeared after that, reappearing eventually as head of the Avalanche cell in Midgar.

The rest was all the more sketchy. The Turks knew he had two lieutenants, both female, and Cloud knew it was Tifa and that other girl, the one with the shuriken. That was pretty much what was known and Cloud sighed. In the end, the dossier was useless, it did not tell him anything new about Tifa, why the girl would join these terrorists.

Yet, perhaps there was a reason to it? The dossier did tell him a lot else, things that could be useful later ahead... Cloud nodded to himself. It was an useful reminder. There was no "why" in this, there was only his job. In his head, he was already working on a plan he could present to the president. Commando was faster, hit heavier and was tougher than anything that Avalanche had. When he was done here he would present a plan of attack on the slums to the president.

Taking up a pen, he began to sketch on the inside of the dossier cover, Flushing Avalanche out wouldn't be too hard, a bait of some sort could draw them out and if you managed to capture some of them interrogations could reveal where their hideouts were. It'd have to go fast but if it did, Commando would descend on the slums, burning the terrorists out of it by raw force. If they could capture that man Barret it would be a terrible blow to all of Avalanche, an officer like that would know a lot. He nodded to himself. Enough with the reactions, it was time for action. Instead of answering to their attacks, the offensive would come.

"You don't get much sleep, do you?" a voice asked from the stairs, Cloud looking back. He had perceived someone there for a while now and wasn't startled. Elmyra was standing halfway down them, her hands on the railing as she looked at him.

"I am trained to only need a few hours of sleep per night." he said. She still didn't like him, that much he had understood. But she had accepted him at least and he was grateful for that. He didn't want to spoil it. "If needed I can stay focused for a week without any sleep." Elmyra shook her head.

"It's unnatural..." she said quietly, almost regrettably. Never the less, she came down the stairs and walked towards the kitchen. "Would you like some tea mister Strife?" she asked, Cloud putting down his pen.

"Yes please." he said, grateful for her desire to be civil. The woman rummaged through the cupboards for a moment and put a teapot on the stove. A few minutes later she came out to the table again, with two cups and the now warmed teapot. The adoptive mother of his ward poured the tea in silence, one that steadily became more tense. It was only about a minute later, when they both had their cups and Elmyra had sat down across the table, that anything was said.

"I'm a guest in your house Mrs Gainsborough." Cloud said, "You don't want me here and I would rather not intrude on a home where I'm not welcome. Yet I have my orders and I will do my job. However, if there's anything you want to tell me, I won't mind." Elmyra nodded, looking vacantly at the flowerpot for a while before she spoke up.

"I don't want Shinra to have anything with Aerith to do." she said now, Cloud being able to tell that the matter was hard for her to bring up.

"No?" he asked, leaning back to listen to her. Elmyra shook her head.

"That girl deserves her own life." she said, "Shinra would take it from her, make her a lab specimen... I can tell you are a good man mister Strife, but the company you work for is one I wouldn't entrust with my daughter if so my life depended on it."

Cloud nodded in understanding and leaned forwards. "Mrs Gainsborough," Cloud began, his voice calm as he did not want to press her. "Aerith is one of the single most important people alive today." he said, "I understand that you only want her to be safe, have the life of a normal girl, but she isn't one and she will never be. It is her destiny, what she is means it was impossible for her to be a normal girl from the start. One way or another she will be tangled up in things, would you prefer Avalanche getting their hands on her?"

"Do you want my honest answer on that question?" Elmyra asked, looking at Cloud with a sad, yet resolute look on her face. Cloud sighed.

"It's not my place to tell you what to think." he said, "But Avalanche are not the good guys in this war. When Shinra discovered how to use Mako energy dozens of other companies went bankrupt and it is the remnants of them that runs Avalanche, not some holy peace lovers or enlightened prophets. It they were, they would not use the methods they use. This dogma of theirs, that they are the Ancients' champions... it is a load of nonsense. The only Ancient alive today is in this house and you can't tell me she would approve of killing hundreds of people for the sake of one destroyed generator."

"They are the only ones who even care about the countless people left with nothing due to Shinra's actions." Elmyra said, Cloud conceding that point... yet.

"Of course they do." he said, "It's a carefully constructed illusion, how they gain their followers. Two thirds of all recruits come from these slums, people who feel they have a debt to Avalanche, but they don't."

"How do you mean?" Elmyra asked.

"Shinra didn't build these slums on purpose," Cloud said, "These old towns were supposed to be abandoned but people refuse to leave no matter what. Avalanche talks about how the old towns still are your homes and how it's right to still love them and when people stay and suffer they hate Shinra for it. But it wasn't Shinra who told them to stay, Avalanche did."

"But why did we have to leave our homes in the first place?" Elmyra asked, "Why did that platform have to be built over our heads? Why did our homes have to be abandoned for our own good? Why couldn't we simply stay where we always had lived?"

"Some times change is painful." Cloud said, "I don't have all the answers. I just know that we have to look forwards. We can't turn back time to prehistory as Avalanche wants, we can only go forwards."

Now the discussion fell silent for a while, none of them having anything more to say. For about a minute, the silence was complete, oppressive, for them both. Cloud noticed the picture standing on the dresser standing at the wall opposite the kitchen. It was a picture of a younger Elmyra, standing side by side with a young man with close-cropped black hair. He stood almost a full head higher than her, having his arms wrapped around her from behind. Both of them were smiling widely, Elmyra seemingly struggling with a laugh.

"My late husband." Elmyra said, leaning her cheek against her hand and with the other hand around the teacup. Cloud looked back at her now. "We had just gotten married when we took that picture."

"If may I ask.." Cloud began, "What did your husband think about taking in Aerith?"

"He didn't think anything..." Elmyra answered. Cloud looked back to her now, a curious look on his face. "He never met her." she took her teacup in both hands now, warming herself on it. She seemed cold. Whether it was from the memories or the night Cloud did not know.

"What happened?" he asked softly.

"It must have been about fifteen years ago now..." she said. "my husband had been drafted and sent to some place called Wutai. He had been gone for months when I got a letter for him, saying that he was coming home for leave. I went to the train station to meet him.. but he never showed up." Cloud got a cold feeling in his gut, understanding where this would lead. "I thought there had been some mistake, perhaps he got delayed... but he never came back." Elmyra continued, "I went back to the station the next day, and the day after that... for weeks I went back there, every day." She shook her head now, seemingly so old all of a sudden. She did not seem to be in her late forties, rather her late sixties. A weak, tired woman marked by the hardships of her life.

"Then..." she continued after a while. "One day, I came across Aerith and her mother... her mother was lying by the stairs to the train platform, Aerith kneeling by her side, begging her to get up." Elmyra looked into the candle light, consumed in the old memories. "You used to see things like these a lot during the war." she said, "When I ran up to them her mother looked at me... planet she was so pale... she only had time to beg me to take Aerith somewhere safe before she died..."

"And you did." Cloud commented softly, Elmyra nodding.

"My husband never came back... I was lonely and the girl had no one... I couldn't leave her there so I took her in." A small smile spread over her face now. "We got along quickly, that girl loved to talk. She talked about how she had fled from some laboratory and that her mother had returned to the planet so she wasn't lonely... Then... one day." The woman closed her eyes for a second now, biting her lips. "She came down from her room and out of nowhere begged me to not cry. She said that someone close to me already had died... that his spirit wanted to come and see me, but that he already had returned to the planet. I didn't understand what she meant... didn't want to understand... but then a letter came, saying my husband had been killed." her voice broke up now somewhat, the woman looking away as the candle light came to reflect in her eyes more than before, the tears glistening in them. Cloud understood how painful it had to be, to not even be able to say good bye. Elmyra eventually recovered, looking at him now. "It was shortly after that that Shinra's men came to us, asking that Aerith came with them. They haven't stopped until now." The woman emptied her teacup now, Cloud nodding slowly. For a second the Shinra Commando and the ageing widow found some measure of common ground, or at least a moment of mutual respect and understanding.

That moment was savagely and mercilessly undone in the next instant as a crash rocked the house. A loud explosion and accompanying tremors made the entire building seemingly lurch. Elmyra cried out in fright, trying to get to her feet but stumbling and falling to the floor. Cloud, meanwhile, was on his feet in one instant, his arms already snapping downwards. With a whipping motion, Cloud send the collapsible metal rod he had hidden inside his right sleeve into his hand and snapped it out to full length. In his left hand a series of square metal pieces, sharpened along two sides, and with a hole going through the other two sides fell into his hand, and Cloud swept the hand outwards, spreading them out in a perfect line in the air. Pushing the metal rod through the holes and finishing with a twirl, he had the sword in hand in one second.

Already having understood where the crash and the scream that now followed came from, right above his head, Cloud kept up the spin, getting down into a low crouch as his free left hand retrieved the heavy pistol from inside the jacket. He aimed upwards, flicking the pistol to full auto and pulling the trigger while still bending his knees, and when he pushed away with full force a full dozen bullets had already left the gun, smashing the wood above him to pieces, and when Cloud shot through the ceiling into Aerith's room he did so easily. Still moving at supernatural speeds, he grabbed the side of the hole he just had created, folding his legs as he spun around 180 degrees and let go. The result was that he hit the ceiling in Aerith's room feet first, his legs absorbing the impact by bending once again.

Now, in this split second that he stood on the ceiling, he got stock of the situation. A large hole was visible where the window and the surrounding wall once had been and Aerith was standing right in front of it, being held by her neck by a lithe, androgynous figure with white hair tight black clothes. The figure's eyes were fixed on him, Cloud being able to tell that just like him, the would be kidnapper registered what happened perfectly. Cloud aimed his pistol hand, the figure responding in kind by raising a gunblade, and in the next instant the bullets were flying. Cloud leaped diagonally downwards, avoiding the spray of metal from the man while his counter-fire forced the kidnapper to step back, one specially well aimed bullet forced him to let go of Aerith's neck lest he lost his elbow. Aerith was sent into a spin as the man leaped backwards, Cloud changing direction once again by pushing with his legs against her bureau. The piece of furniture was sent flying into the wall with a crash as Cloud flew past the still falling Aerith, his gun raised and blazing as his sword deflected the man's bullets.

The two landed outside the house, at separate ends of the garden, and they did so sliding along the ground from the high-speed aerial battle they just had fought. The man rose to his full length, a modest such, and lowered his gun. Cloud did the same, slowly stepping towards him. The first exchange was over, Cloud and his opponent now both processing what they knew.

"You are good." the young man said, there was something uncannily familiar about him. His features, his grace, his allure, it reminded Cloud of someone. He didn't say anything, instead stepping sideways, sword in one hand and gun in the other. Like two fighting tigers, the two prowled in a circle, watching each other. The young man smiled now. "Not much for talking I see?" he said, "Brother guessed that."

"Who is that?" Cloud asked, keeping his senses completely focused on the man, knowing that he was in big trouble. Whoever this was, he had to be part of the group, organisation or whatever that had been digging around for Aerith. The young man raised his hand now, waggling his finger.

"Ah, ah, ah, ah." he said, still with that smile on his face. "You won't find out so easy." he grinned.

Cloud narrowed his eyes and the next second he was heading towards the silver-haired young man at top speed, firing his gun as fast as he could. His sword waved through the air, deflecting the bullets that came flying his way, and the two clashed in the middle of the garden. The guns kept blazing however, Cloud and his opponent both manoeuvred around, managing to fire off shots despite the close quarters. Gusts of wind were kicked up from the sheer speed of their movements, flower being thrown up into the air and spinning around them. Cloud swung his sword upwards and the silver-hair stepped to the side, Cloud followed up by spin-kicking at the man only to have him avoid that as well, following up with a barrage of bullets as the man was now as somewhat closer range, his sword flicking aside a series of quick, sharp attacks from the blades mounted on the man's guns.

The battle was supernaturally quick and graceful, after years in Commando and serving alongside a Soldier first class Cloud had learned everything about body-control and precise movement. But the man was even better, he was impossibly graceful and Cloud felt it like he was fighting a cloud of mist. The flower petals didn't help either, he was sure many could consider it poetic, but the mass amount of small, twirling pieces made it a bitch to get a good overview of things. His opponent seemed unperturbed however, showing it by the powerful and accurate kick he landed in Cloud's chest. Cloud was thrown backwards, grunting but never the less able to respond. Having been kicked out of the whirlwind of flowers, he narrowed his eyes and pointed his palm towards it. The swirling artificial tornado and the countless flowers in it were now the position of his attacker's only and Cloud's hand blazed for one split second before the blast of fire hit the tornado, the flowers catching on fire in one instant.

The fiery tornado died as quickly as it had flamed up, Cloud landing on his hands and pushing away to land on his feet. Raising his gun towards the place where the man had stood, he got a sinking feeling in his guts when he saw that the man was still standing, utterly unarmed. The sinking feeling in his gut was soon accompanied by an utter kick in it as the young man looked up at him, smiling in a detached, even deranged way. With the flames having gotten hold of the flowers around him, they now framed him perfectly and the flashback was instant and powerful.

Sephiroth! That was who the young man reminded him of! The allure, the grace, the supernatural agility and speed! Horror clenched its icy hand around his heart. It was not him, yet somehow that did not give Cloud the least comfort, only further horrified him. "Brother" the man had said, was it Sephiroth he meant?! Now the would-be-kidnapper, Sephiroth's kin if he now was that, raised his gun again. Cloud only barely managed to parry it but the tremor of the blade in his hand as the bullet hit it kick-started him.

Anger flooded him, anger at this figure, this... effeminate Sephiroth copy. Cloud charged in wild rage. He had defeated Sephiroth once before and he'd do it again! This... whoever this androgynous freak of nature was... whatever he was, would not get out of here alive! Fear and shock turned to rage and Cloud nearly went berserk. His opponent only laughed, parrying his attacks with the same impossible grace, something that only further angered Cloud. As the garden kept burning the two kept fighting, Cloud pushing at him in wild anger, the flames burning as hot inside him as around him. The slippery little bastard only kept laughing, his smug, cocky laughter grating on Cloud's soul. Lurching forwards, his opponent was then right up in his face , streaking past Cloud and actually reaching up, a finger running along Cloud's jawline, something that nearly made every last bit of sense go out of the window.

"Delicious." the figure said, dancing backwards as fast as Cloud could pursue him, "Brother doesn't know what he missed out on!" raising his finger. A small stain of sweat had gathered on the gloved hand from Cloud's jaw and the androgynous young man licked it off. "Delicious indeed," he groaned, Cloud sickened by the sight. Charging wildly, he was rewarded by the sick bastard sidestepping and slicing his arm with the gunblade. Cloud grunted in pain, stumbling but remaining on his feet. Spinning around, he had only just enough time to get his sword up to parry another swarm of bullets, the shower of sparks from this barrage blinded him when his opponent shot past him, slicing up Cloud's leg. Cloud's attempt to counter attack hit only air and amongst the burning flowers the Commando found himself bit by bit cut the shreds.

The man had been playing with him! Cloud forced himself to move, speeding up his body through materia, but never the less he found himself outmatched all of a sudden. The frustration and the rage almost choking him, swipe after swipe hitting only air. The fire around him died bit by bit, the flowers quickly reduced to ashes, and Cloud in the end sunk to one knee, gritting his teeth in anger. Raising his sword, he tried to deflect another swipe from his still unnamed attacker but the sword ended up torn out of his hand by the impact. A kick to the face sent him to the ground, his head spinning. Blinking as the blood flowed down his nose, Cloud looked up from his bed of hot ashes to see his attacker stand above him.

"Good bye, Cloud Strife." the man said, almost sounding as if he regretted it. "I would have liked more of you." he said before the garden was flooded in light. Cloud first now became aware of the roaring of helicopters. Shaking his head, he looked up to see several helicopters in the air around them, ropes already falling from them as black-clothed Commandos rappelled down from them.

"You are surrounded! " a loudspeaker blared, "Drop your weapon, get down on your knees and put your hands above your head!" his attacker narrowed his eyes now. Making a frustrated sound, he swung the gun towards one of the helicopters and fired, blowing the helicopter out of the air before he spun around and shot away at blinding speeds, a torrent of bullets striking the ground all around him as he ran, leaping over a wall and disappearing in seconds. Cloud looked after him, realizing first now that he was trembling with exhaustion. His men came up to him, spreading out across the garden and into the building to secure the area. A medic, discernible by the white circle with a red cross in on his helmet and torso, came up to him to check on him. Cloud only pushed him aside however, getting to his feet despite the protests of his cut and exhausted body.

Stumbling towards the house, he forced himself by sheer willpower, concern for his ward blazing in his mind. Inside the house Aerith and her mother both stood by the table, the latter holding her arms protectively around the former as the Commandos moved into the house. Cloud had to lean against the doorway, panting with exhaustion and relief at the sight. She was unhurt... first now Cloud could relax somewhat, however the exhaustion meant he almost fell down.

"Oh planet!" Aerith exclaimed now when she saw him. The look in her eyes made Cloud understand just how mauled he was. The girl was horrified. He nodded in silent agreement.

"We're moving you first thing tomorrow." he said, Aerith's defiance showing itself once again. "I won't risk that man attacking again." Cloud cut her off, "Next time we won't be this lucky." he said, looking at the nearest trooper. "Who called in this force?" he asked him.

"I did." a voice said behind him. Cloud looked back and saw how one of the Turks stood outside the house, the tall, bald and taciturn "old faithful" amongst them, Rude. He was over six feet tall, with a small beard and sunglasses despite the night. His uniform, unlike his partner Reno, was immaculate and his hands covered with leather gloves. He came up to the house, calmly stepping past Cloud and taking care to not brush him. "Tseng ordered me to keep an eye out and call in backup if needed." he said, Cloud nodding. He guessed that had been their plan, Tseng didn't leave things to chance. However Aerith flared up now.

"Didn't we say just one bodyguard!?" she asked now, angry. Cloud gave her a glare dry as the desert.

"Do you have a problem with not being kidnapped?" he asked, anger flaring up in him as well. He got to his feet proper and stumbled up to her. "That helicopter that just got shot down had two crew members." he said coldly, "Two people who just now died to save you. If my Commandos weren't as fast as they were several of them would have died as well. Don't complain about their sacrifice." he was outwardly calm but his voice was glacial, enough cold anger filling it that Aerith did not find the ability to retort. Cloud turned to the Commando beside him. "Get the area locked down," he said, "Report back to the board what happened here. We're taking her to a safe house tomorrow and I want a full guard here until them."

"Yes sir!" the man saluted, Cloud nodding in response.

"Mister Rude." he said, turning to the quiet man, "Tell Tseng to draw up plans for the transfer. It's a request but he has to be done before dawn. Also recommend he doubles the efforts in finding out just who that man was." Rude nodded in understanding.

"I'm not going anywhere!" Aerith said now, protesting vehemently. Cloud looked back at her once again.

"Let me put it this way. If you don't you will be taken the next time." he said matter-of-factly, "If you do, Zack will run after you, no matter what the president says. He'll be declared rogue and I will be ordered to kill him, an order I won't like but will execute." Aerith stiffened now, Cloud nodding. "Mrs Gainsborough," he continued, turning to Elmyra, "I'd suggest you get your bags packed, you won't be back here for a while." Elmyra seemed as though she wanted to protest but she didn't, only nodded in reluctant understanding. Aerith fumed still but Cloud ignored it, turning around to walk outside to get hold of that medic. In the doorway, he bumped into Zack now, the man coming running at full speed towards the door and almost knocked him over. The two froze now, looking at each other. The hurtful words of last time were still fresh in their minds and Cloud didn't know what to say at first.

"Go talk some sense into her." he said eventually. To the hells with niceties, the Sephiroth-lookalike still had him spooked. "We're moving her and I'd appreciate if she didn't struggle." With that, he turned and left, his mind consumed with what just had happened. They needed to get the Turks on investigating that man and his supposed "brother", Cloud had a very bad feeling about the whole thing.


	3. Chapter 3

Cloud rubbed his eyes, exhausted still despite coffee and magic both. He could function, but it wasn't pleasant. Dawn had just come and the activity around Aerith's home was frantic to say the least. Helicopters came and left, troopers walked this way and that and in the middle of it all he say by the Gainsborough table, reviewing the files that Tseng had sent him only moments earlier via Rude. The candle was put out, dawn giving what light Cloud needed.

Cloud couldn't be more grateful for the man's thoroughness and attention to detail, a plan was already drawn up for how to transport Aerith to the Shinra tower quickly and expediently. They had already delayed here for too long, if Avalanche wasn't aware of their presence by now he would eat his boots. It was probably only the fact that the entirety of Commando was present that had stopped them from being attacked. Thankfully their choppers had added enough uncertainty to what was going on here, flying back and forth still. Now they could slip Aerith aboard one of them, taking her to the Shinra tower without any traces of it being anything more than a normal helicopter transport. The sooner Aerith was out the slums the better, even though she and Zack both had been angry about it. Cloud had been adamant however, also Rude had returned with an executive order from the president himself, giving Cloud full authority to oversee this. Along with Rude had come Reno, the man currently balancing on the hind legs of the chair with his feet on the table.

"Shoulda been a Turk Strife." Reno said as he watched Cloud work. "You'd put Tseng to shame."

"It's my job." he said atonally, Reno chuckling.

"Nice." he said. "The heli should arrive soon, think the girl's stopped PMSing about the whole thing yet?" Reno looked up towards the stairs, Aerith had been up there ever since the attack, refusing to come out of the guest room she had shut herself in.

"No not really." Cloud sighed. "I wish it hadn't come to this." Reno shrugged.

"Wishes don't count for much do they?" he said. Cloud rose from the chair now, Reno looking up. "Speak of the devil." he said as the sound of an approaching helicopter could be heard. "Let's roll." he got off the chair with a cat-like move and got to his feet. Rude had been standing with his arms crossed by the bureau this whole time and he pushed away from the wall. Cloud taking the lead up the stairs and the two Turks following him. The door was still closed and a Commando was posted outside. Cloud dismissed him and knocked on the door. For a good while there was no response from inside and Cloud eventually sighed, pounding on the door more forcefully.

"Aerith!" he said, loudly enough that it could be heard. "It's time. Open the door." in the end the door opened and Aerith appeared in the doorway, looking at Cloud with cold eyes. The progress they had made yesterday seemed wiped out and they were back on square one. Or rather, the pieces were taken off the board and it all had gone back into the box and stored away in the attic. Cloud felt a small pang or regret about the entire situation, but it did not stop him in doing his duty. He respectfully stepped aside and let her past, Zack being right behind her. They walked out of the house towards the once vibrant garden, now reduced to ashes and cinders only, where the helicopter stood waiting for them. Cloud felt a powerful sting of regret at the sight. The beautiful garden was ruined, years of work had gone to waste here and left only ashes and death in its wake. This vibrant oasis was turned into a wasteland, and the guilt lay with him. The thought that there wouldn't be any more flowers here made him a bit queasy and he made a point of not looking at Aerith, he wasn't sure he'd be able to handle seeing the pain that this put her through. Rude walked up to the helicopter, gesturing for Aerith to move aboard. Yet when Zack tried to board as well Cloud stopped him, internally cringing at what would come now. He shook his head, being answered with Zack tearing his arm away from him.

"I'm going, okay?" his friend said, his glare challenging, angry. Cloud wondered if their friendship had ever before been so battered that Zack looked at him like this. He did not think so. Cloud shook his head and grabbed Zack again.

"If you do you'll telegraph that something important is aboard that chopper to every Avalanche spy in the slums." he told his friend calmly, "You stay, got it?" he hated this, hated having to order his friend like this. He wished Zack could just accept it, stop any further arguing.

"No:" Zack said, "She's not going alone, I don't trust the president in this, let me go or I'll..."

"You'll do what?" Cloud asked, "Disobey a direct order? Assault me? She will be fine Zack, you'll have at most an hour apart and your presence will only endanger her more." the rotor of the helicopter started spinning faster now, kicking up clouds of ash and dirt. Zack looked back, his mako-coloured eyes showing his frustration as the helicopter and Aerith both lifted from the former garden. Eventually tearing away, Zack stormed off, fuming with anger, and Cloud was left standing in the savaged garden, hating what he was doing. In the end he shook his head and looked at the two Turks, heading back to the house to wrap things up there.

\------xxxxxx------

In the helicopter, meanwhile, Aerith was still angry, afraid and uncertain. The terrible battle of yesterday had terrified her and Zack's friend had only served to more and more confuse her. One second he was a shy sweetie and the other a stiff Shinra asshole through and through. She didn't know what to think of him. And now she was going to the Shinra tower. She was terrified of what would happen. Yet after a while the co-pilot looked back at her, taking off her helmet. Aerith was surprised to see a head filled with long hair instead of the usual close crop all Shinra troopers seemed to have. The co-pilot smiled at her.

"Don't worry your holiness." she said, "Those Shinra bastards aren't getting their hands on you, not today." Aerith's heart skipped a beat with relief and joy as she understood. It was Avalanche! Her friends had come for her! The co-pilot looked at the pilot and nodded, the man giving a thumbs up and a wry grin as he changed heading, the Shinra helicopter veering off course and rapidly descending amongst the sector seven buildings. Before Shinra understood what had happened the helicopter was already abandoned and destroyed, the Ancient slipping out of their hands in seconds.

The president of Shinra leaned back in his opulent office chair, sighing. The balding, blonde man closed his eyes and reached up and massaged his temple with two meaty fingers, the other hand holding onto his expensive cigar. His face was calm but his moustache twitched somewhat, showing his anger.

"So to sum this up." he said slowly, "You let the Ancient out of your sight for a few minutes and instantly lost her?"

"I have no excuse sir." Cloud said, standing at attention in front of the president's massive desk. The giant desk/computer hub was large enough that Cloud at the moment stood nearly ten meters away from him and still almost touched the desk. It was par for the course though, everything in the room he stood in was massive. The entire top floor of the Shinra skyscraper was dedicated to this office and adjacent rooms, the floor in black and white marble and the pillars standing in long rows on both sides of him. Cloud had always found the place incredibly gaudy but at the moment he felt the effect on him keenly; he felt so very small and so very insufficient. The president looked at him with a sneer on his wide face.

"So you say." he grunted, "But that really doesn't help us as it is, right? Avalanche has just won one of their greatest victories ever and now Shinra stands here looking like a bunch of idiots!" he punctuated the last word by slamming his hand into the armrest on his chair and Cloud gritted his teeth. He hated this, he hated this feeling of inadequacy, this shame. To think that Avalanche had had sleeper agents that far within Shinra that they could pull something like this, switching out the helicopter pilots... Cloud felt how the anger seethed in him, anger and shame, to a level that threatened to overwhelm him. The president leaned back and took a puff from his cigar. Slowly breathing out a smoke circle, the man looked at Cloud. "Your record has two blemishes in it." he said, "Firstly your failure against Avalanche at the Mako generator, second this. This is your last chance captain Strife. If you can salvage this situation I'm willing to let your two previous failures slide. Otherwise you're looking at a future as full time security officer at our outpost at Icicle Inn, that outpost we only man if needed. Do I make myself clear?" the man finished, looking at Cloud through narrowed eyes and with menace in his voice.

"Yes sir!" Cloud saluted, fully ready to kill someone, so angry he was. "I already have a plan for how to deal with the situation."

"Oh really?" the president said, raising an eyebrow. "Let's hear this," he said, "You do have half a brain but you will have a hard time convincing me." Cloud nodded. The shame spurred him, drove him to act, to perform. He quickly and succinctly drew up the plans that had formed inside his mind ever since he first became aware of their disgraceful failure. The time for half-hearted actions were long gone, now it was time to throw all of Shinra's power into this struggle. The president listened silently, eventually nodding with an appraising look on his face.

"Approved." he said simply, "You're in charge of this operation, I'll have Heidegger give you command of whatever forces you'll need for it."

"The more the better sir." Cloud said, the president nodding absently. His mind was already somewhere else.

"You're dismissed." he said absently, Cloud saluting and turning around with a snappy spin of his heel. He swiftly walked out of the office, leaving it via one of the two giant stairs at the far end of it. This he much preferred, to be able to act, to do something rather than to sit still. Upon coming down the stairs, however, he came to see Zack. His friend was standing by the end of the stairs, arms folded and a thunderous look on his face. For one second Cloud wanted to turn around but he remembered that there were no other way down from the president's office unless he took a helicopter. Mentally bracing himself, Cloud therefore continued down the stairs and soon caught Zack's eyes. His friend nodded towards one of the side rooms on the lower floor and Cloud silently followed him into it. The room, a small conference such, was empty, meaning there was no one else to see when Zack closed and locked the door before turning towards him. His friend was furious, his eyes showing his anger, fear and helplessness. Cloud could only look at him, wanting to say something but not knowing what.

"If it wasn't you I'd have clocked you in the face right now." Zack said, his voice hoarse. Cloud looked away, feeling the shame burn in him once more. Zack hated this entire ordeal so much and the only reason he had gone along with it was Cloud, who just had let him down totally. "Tell me you've come up with something." Zack said now, hiding his face in his hands. "That you can get her back... I can't lose her Cloud..." Cloud now took the initiative, reaching up and grabbing Zack's shoulders. Pushing Zack's face up, he looked his friend right in the eyes.

"I swear Zack." he said, "I've talked to the president and he's authorized a new strategy. We're gonna get her back, no matter what it takes, and Avalanche will regret ever pulling this trick on us." Zack sighed now before he pulled Cloud into a rough hug.

"You're the only man I trust in this damn place." he whispered. Cloud could tell how terrified he was. For the sole remaining Soldier first class this was so painful. Yet, after a few seconds Zack pulled away from the hug and slapped himself in the face before a slightly forced grin settled on it. "Right." he said now, doing his best to not despair. "What did the boss say? What needs kicking, what's the details, what are we doing?" Cloud smiled slightly at his friend.

"Nothing today." he said, "At least not you. I'll have to plan this out with Heidegger, we move out soon though."

"Ouch." Zack winced, "Don't envy you." he said, his feelings for the head of Shinra's public division was all too evident and Cloud knew, sadly, that the sentiment was fully mutual. Heidegger despised Zack, considered him untrustworthy, and only tolerated him on direct orders from the president. Zack now gave him a thumbs up along with a brave attempt at a smile and Cloud nodded, the two clasping their hands together before Zack left, taking the stairs as he always did. Cloud, however, went to the elevator. He preferred not to take twenty-two flights of stairs for no reason. Also: he preferred to think on his own.

He hadn't shown it, but what Zack had said had unnerved him. Never before had his friend's precarious position at Shinra become so evident and Cloud didn't like it, not one bit. Zack was a person who was bad at loyalty to institutions, he preferred to show it to people and ideals instead. With Aerith kidnapped now... it was risky, the terrorists could exploit that... perhaps in the end, Zack would decide to go with Avalanche instead?

No... he wouldn't... not Avalanche, as much as Shinra was a place not very compatible with his friend, the terrorist organisation run by a faceless, unknown person prepared to do anything was even worse. Also, he was still here: Cloud, his closest friend, was still with Shinra and would remain so... Was he the only reason Zack remained? The sound of the elevator arriving snapped him out of his thoughts and he sighed as they opened and he stepped inside. Just as the doors closed however, another figure came running towards them.

"Wait!" the person yelled, "Hold that elevator!" Cloud almost instinctively pushed out his foot to stop the doors from closing. They doors slid open again and a few seconds later the man who had yelled got into the elevator. It was one of Shinra's division heads, Reeve Tuesti. He was the head of Shinra's urban development division and was also the architect who had designed the mako generators in use by Shinra. Unlike the bombastic Heidegger, the snobbish Scarlet or the miserably incompetent Palmer, Reeve was at the same time competent, agreeable and humble. While Cloud didn't make any judgements on his superiors he knew well that in the end of the day Reeve was the man he respected the most. Zack claimed the man was boring but Cloud never had had any such problems with him.

"Thank you." the black-haired, goatee and moustache-adorned man said. He was panting somewhat, Cloud thinking to himself that the man really should train some more if such a short dash made him tired. He didn't say anything however, only nodded and reached for the panel on the wall.

"Which floor sir?" he asked politely.

"Seventeenth." Reeve told him and Cloud obliged, pushing it and then pushing the forty-fifth, the floor to which he was going. The doors soon closed again and they went on downwards. Reeve cleared his throat after taking a deep breath, glancing at Cloud before he spoke up. "I heard of what happened in the slums." he began, "I hope you weren't held accountable for it." Cloud shrugged.

"Thank you for your concern." he said, " But it doesn't matter. Avalanche will pay in the end." Reeve clasped his hands behind his back and nodded slowly.

"The president hinted at something similar..." he said. "The war with them will be escalated, right?" he sighed. Cloud nodded.

"What they just did can't go unpunished." he said, "They've obviously learned of what she is; we have to hit them first before they use this." That was the nightmare scenario, a living, breathing Ancient in Avalanche's hands, it would be used as a tool to spread their dogma and make previously sane people clasp onto it by the thousands. The violence would escalate to unheard proportions. Hopefully a pre-emptive strike could prevent the worst bloodshed.

"So we do..." Reeve said, he didn't sound too convinced. "I just wish this entire war was over. All it seems to cause is death and destruction and I'm left picking up the pieces." Cloud supposed that was true. Reeve was a builder, preferred to create rather than destroy. This conflict to him was only an endless parade of damage assessments and expenses to rebuild. Cloud could see why Reeve hated this.

"At least you still have that reactor." he commented. Reeve chuckled at this.

"I suppose." he said. "I must thank you for that. If it had been destroyed the death toll would have been terrible. None of us wants that."

"Don't thank me yet." Cloud said, "What will come now won't be pretty." The elevator came to a stop now at his floor and Cloud stepped out, nodding towards Reeve one last time before the doors closed.

\------xxxxxx------

At early dawn several days later the roads leading down into the slums came to rumble and groan under the pressure as Shinra moved into the slums at full force, The entirety of Shinra's peacekeepers in Midgar along with expeditionary units from across the world moved across them, flooding into the slums. Hundreds of armoured transports rolled through the slums, accompanied by giant scorpion robots and hover-droids. The skies were filled with an armada of helicopters accompanied by heavily armed flying drones and even several large flying weapons platforms, each with enough guns to destroy a city block.

Tens of thousands of peacekeepers had been deployed into the slums and with enough machines and air support to fight a major war the blue-clothed iron fist of Shinra began to search every last building in the slums. Kicking in the doors and driving the inhabitants out of their homes at gunpoint Shinra's methods were quick, efficient and brutal. The slums descended into a cacophony of sounds and screams, terrified children, arguing adults, the roar of helicopters above and the booming of loudspeakers crying out that Avalanche's misdeeds was the the reason this happened. Shinra showed their brute force in the most blunt way possible, cowering the slums into submission. The sheer, overwhelming force cowed crime lords, gang leaders and local militias all into submission, especially after the few initial attempts at armed resistance were dealt with so swiftly and brutally that it more resembled massacres than battles that left entire blocks turned into cinders. Indeed even the most peaceful city blocks still saw devastation, the armed transports forced their way through when no sufficient path was found, the ramshackle shanties and shacks at times collapsing merely from the vibrations in the ground. In the wake was left terrified and brutalized people who looked at the Shinra troopers as they vanished with hate in their eyes.

Up in the Shinra tower another set of eyes were showing their emotions plainly, however it wasn't quite hate. It was shock however, shock and anger. Zack had been watching the video feed from the operation for several minutes now, not able to believe his eyes. The Soldier first class eventually tore himself from the series of monitors he had been watching inside the large communications central filled with computer and TV screens, blanketed by a gloom only interrupted by these screens and and countless cold blue and green lights. Looking eventually towards the other end of the room he saw Cloud standing in front of another monitor. He was watching what happened with a calm, pondering look on his face as one hand held his other elbow so the second hand could brush across his upper lip in gesture showing his deep concentration. Zack eventually stormed over to him, crossing the large control centre from which Shinra ran this entire operation. Reaching Cloud, he was about to grab hold of his friend when Cloud raised his hand, making Zack's hand clasp around his wrist rather than on his shoulder.

"Don't." Cloud said, his voice glacial. "You're already deep in trouble, don't make it worse."

"Make it worse?!" Zack hissed in disbelief. "Did you get this authorized?! Is this your idea!?" he waved at the main screen which currently showed how a large shanty collapsed as people ran out of it, a cloud of dust being kicked up around the people as their home fell apart behind them.

"Zack..." Cloud said now, "Shut up. Just shut up. I'm trying to get your girlfriend back. Avalanche will explode in power if they keep her. We have to get her out, some ruffled feathers in the slums is a tiny price for that!"

"You're tearing the slums apart!" Zack snarled. "Those are peoples' homes you're razing! This'll play right into Avalanche's hands! Have you completely lost your mind!?"

"Men!" Cloud said loudly now, a pair of Shinra peacekeepers coming up to him from their posts at the door. "Escort mister Fair here to the gym." Cloud ordered, the peacekeepers saluting him. "Go work out that stress Zack," he said to his friend now, "Do some squats, whatever. Stop destroying your only chance of seeing her again! Let me do my job and get your girl back. Will you sacrifice her for the sake of some shacks?!" With that, Cloud turned back to watch the screen. Half the room had seen the entire débâcle now and Cloud made a gesture for the peacekeepers to take Zack away. The Soldier first class was not done however

"What's wrong with you Cloud!?" Zack hissed, "This isn't the guy I know! When did you become Heidegger's attack dog!?"

"Take him away." Cloud said, watching the screen without even glancing away and now the peacekeepers half dragged Zack out of the room. Cloud remained standing there, watching the screen and clenching his hands in order to not tremble. He hated this, he hated it so much. Every house torn down there could have been Aerith's, every people chased out could have been her or her mother. Cloud begged desperately to whomever would listen that it would work. If he could pull this off, both this part and the other, secret one, it would be worth it. They'd have decapitated Avalanche and gotten Aerith back to Zack. He didn't need to forgive him, Cloud just hoped that it'd get Zack to stay away from the abyss he was approaching. He couldn't lose him, not now. If Aerith was with Shinra Zack would be tied there, become less rebellious. Cloud begged it would work. If it didn't... Cloud could only see a dark abyss at the end of that path, Shinra gone, Avalanche having plunged humanity into darkness, him having lost everything that mattered, not to mention that Sephiroth figure... the Commando captain was so afraid of what lay ahead, he had to stop it. The pain and misery he caused mihjy very well be one he'd never be able to repay, but if Zack stayed away from that abyss, it was worth it.

The slow, lumbering juggernaut of Shinra's full military might tore through the slums, leaving no rock unturned and no passage unexplored. The main areas were searched by peacekeepers and the smaller, riskier passages by Commando. The skirmishes that broke out were as a rule short and violent. Avalanche, for all the danger they posed, was an underground movement, not a revolutionary army. Their sympathisers and collaborators were legion, their actual military limited, at least in the city that was Shinra's great fortress. Bloody skirmishes broke out here and there as Avalanche fortified buildings and passages, desperately trying to hold the Shinra forces away. The spirit of these self-proclaimed defenders of the planet was strong, yet their flesh weak and their guns underpowered. Shinra's vehicles, heavily armed troopers and elite Commandos steadily ground them back. Barricades were blown to shreds with high-powered cannons, fortified buildings cleared out with knockout gas and ambushes driven back in bloody shootouts.

All the while, Cloud watched from the command room, silently waiting for when the next phase would start. The endless waiting had more and more pent up inside him and he, while remaining calm outwardly, begged for the reaction he was expecting to happen. It had to, otherwise... he preferred not to think about it. None other than the president and him knew of this secret second part of the plan. Then, a slow, beeping sound from one of the panels near the main screen made him almost jump out of his skin.

"Turn to camera eighty-seven!" he commanded instantly, the main screen changing to show a stairwell on the side of the building, a nearly forgotten emergency exit. Cloud couldn't help but smile when he saw the sight. People were running inside it, climbing the stairs at high speed. Three people, all being people he recognized. The massive Barret Wallace, that unidentified ninja girl and lastly, Tifa. Cloud permitted himself a small triumphant fist-pump. It had worked! Avalanche couldn't hold out forever in the slums, they needed a respite of some kind in order to be able to flee, some element to cause confusion. With the Shinra building nearly emptied of guards and the president as a big juicy target they could with a bit of audacity cut the head off the snake. That would paralyse all of Shinra. It was too perfect to not go for it. Cloud turned to one of the men beside him, a man from the sole remaining squad of Commando troopers present in the building. Cloud had saved them for this very moment.

"Saddle up." he said, "They've come. It's time to end this."

"Yes sir..." the man saluted sharply and his voice betrayed his eagerness. The last time his men and Avalanche had clashed it had left an entire squad broken and out of action for weeks. Their brothers in arms were spoiling for revenge against these people and now the time had come. Like him however, eagerness made them more focused, not sloppy. That was the trait Cloud was the most proud over having installed in them and as he walked out from the room, handing over command to a peacekeeper colonel, he grabbed his helmet with a face that was impassive but a heart that was aflame.

When he got out he put the helmet on and took the lead down the empty, echoing hallway. They all moved at top speed, running at the pace only they could handle through the corridors with weapons in hand as they headed for floor sixty, the floor that separated the rest of the building from the top ten as it was called, the place where the really important facilities lay. Floor sixty was mainly empty, a transitional floor mostly filled with decorative statues and the checkpoint you had to pass through. The two guards there had been instructed to pretend they didn't see the Commando troopers as they burst out into the room and took up positions behind the statues. They would come from the side door and when Cloud and his men took cover they were completely hidden.

His heart pounded as the seconds ticked away. The surveillance system of the Shinra building was directly linked to his helmet visor and could provide updates on the movement of the Avalanche team. Yet they seemed to move so slowly and Cloud patiently breathed in and out, checked his equipment one last time and stopped himself from fidgeting. He glanced to the side, meeting one of the peacekeepers' eyes. He nodded towards Cloud, showing he knew what was going on. Professional...

When the door opened it was almost a deafening sound to him even though it was almost inaudible to normal people. The two peacekeepers had started to chat, working with the team to make the Avalanche people think they were unnoticed. Silently, silently they crept into the room, all three of them. Even the giant Barret moved almost totally soundlessly

"Think they'll pull it off?" one of the peacekeeper guards asked his friend now, the other peacekeeper shrugging.

"Dunno." he said, "I'm sure glad to be here instead of down there though." his friend laughed at this.

"Yeah, it's like, what? Us and five other guys in the building now?" they both shared a laugh at this, Cloud seeing via the video feed how the Avalanche trio crept up on them. Barret raised his gun, exchanging a look with his companions. Cloud nearly sprung the trap there, he wasn't going to let those two men die there. However he didn't do so, the video feed showed him Tifa shaking her head and pointing towards the stairs. For a few seconds the massive black man and the young woman stared down each other but the former shrugged in the end. They moved across the room, behind the backs of the peacekeepers and towards the stairs. Cloud took a quiet breath and gave the signal, stomping his foot against the floor.

In one second the trap was sprung, the Commandos all stepped out from behind the pillars, their weapons raised and aimed directly at the trio of terrorists. Indeed, even the two peacekeepers had acted, drawing their pistols with remarkable speed.

"Don't move." Cloud said, calmly but with power in his voice . They were standing in the middle of the room, with twelve guns aimed at them, ten of these being Commando, who everyone knew didn't miss. There were over a dozen metres to the closest cover and they had nowhere to run. It was over.

"... Aw shit..." Barret said, looking around. The man's face was shocked and angry equally much.

"It was a trap!" Tifa exclaimed, her voice shocked, shivering. Cloud felt a surge of emotions at this but remained calm. He couldn't break now

"You terrorists are pathetically predictable at times." he said slowly, walking out towards them. "Dangle a price like this in front of you and you bite instantly." Barret gritted his teeth now and Tifa could be seen clenching her fists. The third girl seemed unperturbed however.

"Yeah!" she said merrily, "More elite mooks. How's your gut from the last time, mister "falling-off-bridges"?" she jeered, Tifa reaching up to place her hand over the girl's mouth.

"Not now Yuffie!" She hissed, Cloud ignored her utterly and instead turned to the two peacekeepers.

"Dismissed." he told them, "Go have some coffee or something." the two men saluted him and headed for the stairs, grateful to be out of danger. Cloud's stomach was still churning but he forced himself to be calm. Tifa or not, she was a terrorist, here to assassinate the president and cause whatever chaos she could. Cloud's duty was clear. He even ignored the fact that the ninja girl, Yuffie, was currently seething. "I have enough respect for you that I'm willing to let you surrender here and now. Tell us where Aerith Gainsborough is and you'll be unhurt."

"How 'bout you suck a bag of dicks?" Barret growled in response. Cloud nodded grimly.

"So be it." he said and looked at his men, "Take them do..." he was cut off now, a blindingly powerful red light came from the trio, Cloud realizing in an instant what it was, his heart skipping a beat from the fright, "Fire!" he screamed, his men unleashing a torrent of gunfire, however their barrage was ineffective, utterly such, as the bullets vaporized mid-air from a sudden shock-wave of heat. In the middle of the room now a towering figure had appeared. This figure, over a dozen feet tall, humanoid and beastly in equal parts, with deep brown skin, animal face, a red mane and long horns seemed to fill up the entire room with its presence and physique both. The figure was tall enough that it had to hunch down to be able to fit inside the room and around it flames, blazingly hot, appeared. Around its feet the very ground was melting from the heat and it was like staring into the sun so hot it was, like having your face inches from a furnace. Cloud knew what the giant thing was.

A Summon, one of the ancient, undefinable beings that could be controlled using some of the rarest and most sought after materia in the world, materia that Shinra was ready to walk over corpses to get hold of. During the Wutai war one single Summon had managed to utterly annihilate an entire regiment of Shinra peacekeepers. They were arcane weapons of mass destruction, nigh unrivaled in power. And they had summoned one... the madmen of Avalanche had summons!

Ifrit, the demon of fire, roared, the roar shaking the building with its sheer power. Then the explosion came, a blast of fire and pressure that made the very air seemingly burst aflame. It pushed outwards, annihilating everything in its path.

Yet the explosion was cut short, when Ifrit vanished again, having only needed a few seconds of presence to cause this devastating damage, the Avalanche members looked up around them to see something disheartening. Having been shielded from the devastating heat and pressure, summons never harmed their summoners, they found that Shinra had outsmarted them. The great corridor they had been standing in was sealed off, powerful metal blast shields had dropped from the ceiling, locking them in a twenty by ten meter steel cage.

"Oh no you don't." Cloud growled, having sunken down to his knees and deployed his magical shield. He stood by the end of the wall, having been sealed in with them. It had been all he could do to vault forwards and deploy the blast shield before the entire floor was blown out. Disabling the shield and rising to his feet, he reached to his back. His assault rifle lay on the ground, twisted and unusable after the heat explosion, yet he still had his sword. Cloud unsheathed the blade, watching the Avalanche trio took half a step back in shock. Barret raised his gun arm, Tifa her fists and Yuffie her large shuriken. Cloud now slammed his hand into the glowing hot wall behind him and summoned an explosion of water. It instantly turned to steam and the entire cage was filled with an incredibly thick fog. Only the curious properties of Ifrit's flames kept them from being scalded, the demon's heat already had mostly vanished, making the fog cold, raw, and thick enough that you couldn't see further than a few meters. Cloud now leaped to the side, avoiding a barrage of gunfire from Barret and slid across the ground, coming to a halt several meters away. He twirled his sword and powered up his multi-spectral goggles. The composite image was formed in seconds, showing him precisely where the three Avalanche people were standing.

Barret was turning around, his gun arm still raised as he wildly swore, and the two girls had frozen, their heads turning in uncertainty at they couldn't see him. They were blinded, could only see a few feet while he saw them perfectly. Now it was time to divide and conquer; bring all he had to bear against one enemy element at a time. That way you could feat vastly superior enemy forces by taking on one part at a time. Cloud moved towards them, slowly, inaudibly, planning to get them by surprise.

He was the one surprised however, the ninja girl reached down to her belt now and took a series of shuriken which she sent flying towards him with complete accuracy. Cloud had to raised his sword and parry, making loud clangs echo through the chamber and Yuffie cry out.

"There!" she yelled, Barret instantly understanding and turning his gun towards Cloud, who had to leap away once again. Clever girl... good senses. She was evidently a real ninja, one of those Wutai elite fighters who had been a massive challenge for Shinra during the Wutai war. Cloud had thought them all gone after Wutai was demilitarized and almost all of its martial traditions banned. Either way, she was the first target.

"Did you get him!?" Tifa asked, Cloud barely even thinking of that it was she now. He was that focused on the battle at hand that her identity faded away from him.

"I dunno..." Barret said, "Didn't hear anythin'." Cloud decided to act now, he needed to break them up. His goggles told him the visibility was about three meters and he stepped forwards, getting into visual range, leaping back when they spotted him. Barret didn't even have time to raise his gun and Cloud ran to the side, reappearing with a smug smirk to the left of where they now were looking. Once again, he leaped away, waiting for the reaction.

"He's playing with us." Yuffie said after a few more appearances, "That google-faced bastard is playing with us!" she was almost seething with anger. Sure enough, she was an aggressive fighter, being provoked by his appearances. Cloud stepped forwards one last time, catching Yuffie's eyes and she was moving before he knew what had happened. Her speed was amazing, it was easy to see how she could have kept up with Zack. Cloud leaped backwards, hearing Tifa cry out further ahead and how she yelled for Yuffie to not do it. Too late however, Yuffie came out of the fog in front of Cloud, shuriken raised and teeth bared in a snarl. She was mid-air, pulling the shuriken back to slash at him. Cloud parried the swift but all too weak blow and swept her shuriken aside. With a leap forwards, he kneed her in the stomach, making her croak as her lungs were paralysed from the blow. Looking up, Cloud saw that Tifa and Barret were running towards him as well and he grabbed Yuffie, darting to the side,

"Where the hell is he?!" Barret hissed as Cloud put more distance between them and him, holding the still paralysed Yuffie.

"Yuffie!" Tifa screamed, her voice showing her fear. In his arms Yuffie began to stir, regaining control of herself again.

"You..." she growled, "Get your hands off me you piece of...!" Cloud knocked her out now with a strike to the neck. Seeing that Barret and Tifa both had managed to notice where he was, he decided to go on the offensive. Tifa dashed towards him instantly and Cloud threw the now unconscious girl in his arms high into the air, in an arc above Tifa and straight towards Barret while he leaped to the side again. However this time he changed direction after a few metres, dashing past Tifa, who couldn't see him, and straight at Barret. The man raised his arm, about to fire when he saw that it was Yuffie. Instead, he immediately lowered his gun and caught her, gently even.

"Yuffie!" he cried out, clearly enraged by what had happened to her as he knelt to put her down, something that left him defenceless when Cloud came at him. He didn't have time to raise his gun arm and Cloud kicked him in the face, sending him backwards yet only stumbling to his feet. The man's head had been knocked back but Barret stopped and turned his face down, growling as he swung his fist right at the advancing Cloud. Cloud switched grip on his sword however, changing it into a backhand grip, and with a twist he spun past Barret, a long, deep gash exploding open across his chest. The black man stumbled once again, looking back at Cloud in shock only to see him spinning through the air, a flying spin kick hitting his face and sending him reeling once again right before Cloud landed and finished by raising his hands and firing a crackling blast of thunder right into the man's chest, propelling him backwards and making him land with a loud thud on the ground. This time he didn't get up.

Now Cloud looked towards Tifa, seeing that the girl already was right in front of him once more. While she didn't quite have Yuffie's speed she had ten times the power and her first strike hit the back of Cloud's hand. He had to let go of the blade in order to absorb the blow better and an almost sudden impulse made him simply take it and not hit back. Tifa unleashed another series of strikes against him, Cloud absorbing every last of them. They hurt, she hit like a charging bull, but they didn't wound him, Her kicks, punches, elbows, knees, they all came at him. Cloud turned, bent or twisted at the last moment to lessen the impact and as Tifa drove him backwards, striking time and time again, he could sense her frustration. She knew she didn't hit properly, that he did something, and her blows became more and more frantic.

"Just die!" she screamed after nearly fifteen seconds of constant rapid-fire attacks against him. Cloud decided to end it there, an attempt by her to kick him in the face was stopped when Cloud caught her leg with both hands and activated another materia, grabbing hold of Tifa's leg as he sent a devastating surge of lightning through her, making her give up a choked scream before Cloud used the leg to swing her through the air and slam her face first into the floor with all his might.

Letting go of her, Cloud turned around to watch the other two. None of them were moving so he deactivated the blast shields and as they rose up the fog dispersed into the rest of the room, the air drying up and his men gaining access to the now devastated middle part of the floor. They came in with weapons raised but raised them upon seeing how Captain Strife stood in the middle of the knocked out trio of terrorists.

"Restrain them and get that man patched up." Cloud said as the adrenaline slowly stopped running through him. He reached into one of his pouches on the tool-belt and pulled out a small, translucent, yellow-ish orb illuminated by an inner light revealing the almost smoke like patterns that seemed frozen into it. Looking at it, he nodded slowly. In minutes they'd know where the Ancient was and this would be over. His men obeyed and only a minute later the now bandaged Barret got a bucketful of ice cold water thrown in his face, something that woke him up roughly and instantly. The man looked around, seeing that he was sitting restrained with his back against the wall and with Cloud standing in front of him. Spitting and coughing, he looked to the sides to see Tifa and Yuffie both unconscious sitting a few metres away.

"Tifa, Yuffie!" he yelled, Tifa actually stirring at this. Cloud knelt in front of Barret, looking him right into the eyes.

"You fought well," he told him, "but not enough. Now, where is Aerith Gainsborough?" he asked, giving the man a last chance. All he got in reply was a wad of spit that hit his goggles. Sighing, he wiped it off and opened the hand he had kept clenched. "The hard way then." he said. A gasp came from the side. The ninja girl had awoken and she stared at the materia.

"That's..." she said.

"Materia." Cloud filled it in. "You ARE aware that Shinra is the premier authority on these things, right?" Yuffie scoffed at this but Cloud ignored her. "Do you want to guess what kind it is?" he asked the girl. Yuffie looked at it with a look on her face that betrayed her knowledge of what it was and also that fear that awoke in her.

"It... manipulates..." she said, "a mind control materia." Cloud nodded.

"Exactly." he said, "Two people in Shinra have the capacity to use this to its fullest extent, it's refined enough that the mental requirements are colossal. Sadly for you, I am one of those two people. I will ask you again. Where is Aerith Gainsborough? Tell me or I will use this to crack your minds open and dig out the knowledge by force!"

"Fuck you!" Barret roared, struggling against the restraints. Cloud slowly shook his head.

"That seems to be all you can say." he said before he pointed the materia at Barret, a beam of light shooting out from it and hitting Barret, who gave up a cry of pain as he tried to resist. The man tensed up, his muscles starting to twitch as he gritted his teeth. A long, drawn-out groan came from his mouth as he tried to resist the invasion of his mind. With a jerking, spasmodic motion he slammed his head back into the wall, making a loud thud echo through the room.

"Get... outta... my... head!" he grunted slowly as Cloud dug his way deeper and deeper into the man's mind.

"Barret!" Tifa struggled against her restraints desperately, "Don't give in!" she screamed.

"Never... in... hell..." Barret hissed, Cloud amazed by his willpower. Forcing more magic into the materia he increased the power, making his victim scream out in pain.

"Will you answer my questions?" Cloud asked

"I..." Barret hissed, hyperventilating, his breath ragged and short, sweat and water running down his brow and his massive chest heaving. "I... will... no... I... I will... " Incredible! He was still resisting! What a man. Cloud found himself with a deep respect for him and a sense of regret that such a strong man had ended up buying into Avalanche's madness.

"Where is Aerith Gainsborough?" Cloud asked once again, Barret not answering, remaining silent. "Speak!" Cloud ordered him after a while and Barret, who almost was starting to froth, slowly opened his mouth, taking a slow breath and seemed about to speak.

"Barret don't!" Yuffie screamed, "Think of Marlene!" Barret snapped his mouth shut, breathing through his nose loud enough that it was like standing face to face with a bull. Cloud instantly noted that word, it had helped Barret to shut up, but it would be his undoing.

"Marlene huh?" he said mildly, "We'll have to look into who that is." That was all that was needed, Barret's will wavered for one small moment. Whoever Marlene was she meant much to Barret, enough that the thought of her hurt made him feel an instinctive surge of fear and anxiety. That undid him, it was a crack in his mental resistance that instantly grew, Cloud worming his way into Barret's mind and completely dominating him in an instant. The man's breathing slowed down, his eyes glazed over and he relaxed. Cloud turned to his men now. "Gag those two." he said and within a few seconds Yuffie and Tifa both had been effectively silenced.

"Where is Aerith Gainsborough?" Cloud asked now. This time Barret answered without any resistance, the magic having completely suppressed his free will.

"In the seventh sector." he said dully, "a bar called seventh heaven."

"In a secret room or something?" Cloud nodded as he asked.

"Yeah..." Barret said, "You hit the pinball machine, right above the small bomb, and it'll sink down into the ground. We hid her there, when the bomb went off we were gonna dash for the sewers." Cloud nodded. They had gone through sector seven already, they had to be well hidden.

"What guards does she have?" Cloud continued.

"My best men." Barret said, "Wedge, Biggs and Jessie."

"No more?" Cloud asked at this. Three men only?

"That's all she needs." Barret said, Cloud nodded. He guessed that was true, a small elite team would move faster and more quickly. He had all he needed, yet...

"Tell me about Marlene?" he said now, wanting the answer to that question.

"She's my baby girl." Barret answered. "Four years old." Cloud sighed at this. That was not good news. Four years old was plenty enough that she'd remember her father, enough to spawn resentment against those who had taken her father away from her.

"Where is she now?" Cloud asked.

"With Aerith." Barret said and Cloud felt how things got hairy again. He had to act on it, they couldn't just abandon the kid in the slums. She's fall in with Avalanche at best, being raised on a cocktail of fanatical dogma and hate towards Shinra, a broken life. Cloud stood up now, motioning for his men to take them all away. The control would wear off in a few minutes, they would be in a cell by then and Cloud's squad on the way to Seventh Heaven to retrieve Aerith as well as Marlene. Cloud felt himself like a scumbag, yet this was the only good option, place her with a foster family somewhere far from Avalanche's reach. Not perfect, but all he could do for the girl who's father he just had caught and who would be executed.

\------xxxxxx------

Not twenty minutes had passed after this when Cloud and his men rappelled down from the helicopter in front of the Seventh Heaven bar, a two-story building quite a lot sturdier than most other buildings around it. Storming into the bar they found that it was totally abandoned and typical for the slums, the chairs and tables both mainly consisted of boxes the liquors behind the shelf all being unmarked, probably moonshine. Cloud walked up to the mentioned pinball machine, thinking of all the times he had watched Zack play this game at a machine much like this one. Motioning for his men to gather around, he slammed the machine in the right spot and stepped back as it sunk into the ground.

A gas grenade flew down into the hole and Cloud listened silently to the screams that came from down there. He could hear Aerith's voice cry out in shock, a young girl screaming in fear and how another woman's voice quickly began to speak soothing words, probably holding her in a desperate attempt to calm the girl. A loud curse preceded a man leaping up through the hole, running up against the wall and throw himself towards the edge in an attempt to grab onto it. All he got for his desperate leap however was Cloud kicking him in the face so he lost his grip and fell down again. The cries were soon replaced by coughs, then by the thuds of bodies hitting the floor, and then nothing.

Donning their gas masks, the Commandos leaped down into the hole and saw the hidden room covered in sleeping gas. Hanging their guns over their backs, the Commandos immediately retrieved their objective and restrained the others before they were dragged outside and tended to in order to not suffocate. Cloud personally carried the small, brown-haired and round faced girl all the way, gently holding her limp body and hating himself for what he was doing.


	4. Chapter 4

Shinra's objectives were met and the peacekeepers pulled out of the slums, knowing well they were not welcome. The thousands of men and vehicles moved up into the city proper again and the aftermath of the fighting was left where it had happened. Cloud, meanwhile, had handed over Aerith to Shinra's "medical teams" as they had claimed to be. Cloud, however, was certain that one of the men had been one of professor Hojo's assistants, something that did not sit well with him. The still unconscious young woman had been transported away without any further ado, the "medical team" not even looking at the others. The three terrorists were easy, off to prison with them. They had been put on the convoy of Avalanche prisoners that were being transported to Shinra's super-prison on the northern continent. The little girl, however, had been left behind without even a second glance and in the end Cloud had been forced to take her on himself, starting some of the most frustrating moments of his life.

The girl soon woke up and was evidently terrified. All attempts by Cloud to calm her failed miserably no matter what he did and in the end he simply had to lock her inside his room and try to get hold of Shinra's child services. It took him a full hour of constant phone calls and heavy-handed authority-waving to even get hold of them, the man who answered that phone being a tired bureaucrat who had initially said they'd send someone over next week. Cloud had been on the verge of physical violence and calmly informed the man he was captain of Commando and that he wanted someone sent instantly. The man on the other end had started grovelling like a dog and soon a suited-up man had arrived, looking more like an used car salesman than someone who worked with children. When said man's first words had been "okay where's the brat" Cloud had slammed him into a wall and told him with a glacial voice that unless he did his job properly and well with this girl Cloud would find out and he wouldn't be pleased.

That was all he could do for the girl, yet her heartbreaking screams as she was dragged away, her desperate cries for "daddy", tore at his soul and most probably would haunt him for a long time ahead. It all came together and left him feeling dissatisfied and unhappy despite the victory. The president, however, was overjoyed. When Cloud came up into the opulent office to deliver the report, not even having had time to get out of his field uniform, the head of Shinra was standing by the windows with a cigar in one hand and a glass of liquor in the other. On his desk a large crystal bottle stood, sparkling in the setting sun.

"Ah, captain Strife!" he said, waving for Cloud to come up. He was evidently extremely pleased "Excellent work, excellent work indeed." he said jovially as Cloud saluted, "Have a drink, it's from my personal stock." Cloud accepted the offer respectfully, pouring his own glass and came up to the man. The president was practically radiating, looking out across the city with a wide grin on his face.

"I take it you've gotten the news then sir." Cloud said amiably, feeling keenly the contrast between the overjoyed president and himself. He decided not to mention it however, not wanting to spoil the man's mood.

"Not only that!" the president said. "According to professor Hojo we'll have figured our little Ancient's powers out fully in ten years." he took a puff of his cigar, blowing out a cloud of smoke. "Ten years captain, after that the promised land will be ours!" he said, Cloud not understanding at first.

"Pardon me sir?" he asked, the president looking at him with one eyebrow raised.

"The promised land." he said, "As in what Avalanche keeps gabbing on about. The place said to be teeming with life. Where there's life, there's Mako captain. Shinra is looking at profits beyond what we've ever seen before! And all is thanks to you captain."

"Just doing my job, sir." Cloud said, grudgingly respecting the president's shrewd business mind, however it wasn't the first, second or even fifth thought that came to him that when you found the paradise the first thing you did was to construct a generator to harvest the life of it. He supposed that was the world, wasn't it?

"Indeed you are." the man grinned, "Tell you what by the way, captain is such a lowly title. After something like this it's time for a promotion, how does major sound?" the man made Cloud startle from surprise. A promotion?!

"Sir I..." Cloud began, overwhelmed, but he was cut off.

"No, that won't work." the president said now, "Major Strife, that's ridiculous. Colonel it is! Colonel Strife! Sounds dashing, no?" Cloud was almost flabbergasted enough to be speechless. A promotion directly to colonel? Over what anyway? Commando was a separate section of Shinra's public order division, one whose top officer was a captain and nothing else. Where would he even be transferred?

"Will I have to leave Commando?" he asked frankly. No promotions could replace his men and the joy of being a part of this absolute elite. The president only waved his hand.

"Pft!" he snorted, "Obviously not, that's where I want you. For now..." he added the last part under his breath and Cloud was just about to ask what he meant. He didn't however, making demands of the president now was not a good idea. He took a sip of his cognac in order to keep his mouth shut. Something about it rankled him, the president was not planning to expand Commando, meaning he was given a purely ceremonial promotion, a decoration only. His thoughts stayed hidden however and he only bowed.

"Thank you sir." he said respectfully. Inside, however, he was more and more outraged. This victory turned sourer and sourer inside his mouth. Devastated homes, desperate children, families torn apart, nonsense promotions, lost friends. Was this really Shinra's finest moment? For him it more and more turned into something he wanted to punch in the face. He held his tongue though, forcing himself to shut up even as he realized he had started to clench the delicate glass in his hand, hard enough that it almost broke. "If I may, there is still a lot to do." he said, the president nodding.

"Of course, Colonel!" he said jovially. "Put your report on my desk .. oh, you did. Then dismissed! Your promotion will be taken care of in the following days."

"Yes sir!" Cloud saluted again, putting down the glass and leaving. He walked down the stairs running a hand through his hair. What the hell was this?! Cloud suddenly felt bile pour up inside him, his loyalty to Shinra more and more starting to fray along the edges. Heading for the stairs, he made a point to not meet anyone's eyes as he passed through the corridor. It was first when he got into the stairwell that he stopped, leaning against the wall with his goggles hitting the wall and his hands against it. He he took a deep breath as he tried to calm down and get focus back. What was he even so upset about?

All these smaller things, they came together, drove him nuts. He lined them up mentally, trying to figure out what to do. The entire ordeal in the slums had been unpleasant at least, there would be a lot of resentment and anger after that. The girl, Marlene, had only worsened it, Cloud couldn't believe now nonchalant the people of the child services had been. As if it wasn't bad enough that they tore a family apart, however necessary it was, she had to be handled by unmotivated bureaucrats. Cloud sighed, deciding he had to talk to Reeve about it. There had to be some way to make it up to the people of the slums. Even it it wasn't, the child services had to be addressed, now preferably. There were ways they could repay the people in the slums, the president hopefully could approve some kind of reconstruction project.

Zack's constant issues with Shinra's orders was also an issue, but they ought to be fixed now, at least temporarily. Aerith was with Shinra, safely, and wouldn't leave. That meant Zack would stay here. Cloud realized that he had for a good while now seriously feared that his friend would rogue. That realization was painful. The Sephiroth lookalike was still troubling him as well, but with the Turks looking into it he had to trust them. They were many things, but incompetent they were not. Avalanche had taken a massive beating, that had given Shinra some breathing space they could use to find out who that man and his "brother" was.

Lastly: Tifa. Cloud sighed once more, processing what lay ahead for her now. She was a convicted terrorist. She'd be interrogated for whatever she could reveal and then either sent to Shinra's super prison or executed. Cloud had been able to fight her without any real problems, yet at the thought of what would happen to her now... it hurt. It was a thought that frightened him. Doubt bubbled up inside him. Was Tifa really so indoctrinated as he had supposed? The scene of her stopping Barret from gunning down those two peacekeepers was carved into his mind, impossible to combine with the image of the Avalanche fanatic, ruthless, hate-filled, violent and without any redeeming traits, that he up until now had known. His conscience wouldn't let him forget it.

In the end he did something impulsive. Hurrying down the white – almost sterile – stairs, he headed for the "containment area", the corner of the 67th floor where the prison cells were. Tifa was being held there along with Yuffie and Barret. They were all going to be interrogated soon, brutally, and when it was done their fates would be decided. Death or a lifetime in prison, whichever remained to be seen. Cloud gritted his teeth, torn by indecision, yet in the end he acted upon the idea that had come to him.

The guard posted at the start of the site corridor where the cells lay saluted him when Cloud came up through the steel corridor. Cloud decided to straighten up a bit. He needed whatever authority he could get right now.

"I'm here to see one of the terrorists." he said as he returned the salute with a no-nonsense attitude. "Tifa Lockheart." he continued, the guard getting something uncertain on his face.

"Uhm..." he said, "We don't know their names yet." Cloud almost snapped at him now. What the hell?! How couldn't they even have gotten that right!? He must have shown at least some anger for the guard instantly flinched and shrunk away from him. "D-do you have a physical description of her sir?" he quickly said, "We've got two women in custody right now." Cloud took a slow breath to calm down.

"She would be the older one." he said, "longer hair and more curves." the guard snapped his fingers now and made an understanding gesture.

"Yes, that one." he said, recognizing who it was, "If you'll come this way sir, I'll have the cell unlocked right away." Cloud followed him silently, anxiety welling up inside him again. It was a bold plan, but right now he had enough favour with the president that it had to be doable. Yes, it would be. The prison corridor was cold and gloomy, all metal and blue lights. It seemed constructed to make people feel cold. As Cloud was shown the door the guard grinned a bit at him. "Wanting to inspect the catch I take it?" he joked as he fumbled with his keys, "Yeah I can't blame you. We should put her on "community service", don't you think? I know I'd like to have a piece of that." He was cut short now when Cloud grabbed him by his collar and pulled him close to his glowing goggles. It was something that always deeply unnerved people and the growl that came from Cloud now only further scared the man.

"You keep your mouth shut, and if you ever make a joke like that again I'll have you transferred to the most remote and miserable outpost I can find." he said icily, enraged enough that he almost lost control of himself. Shoving the man backwards into the wall, he nodded towards the door and the now terrified guard quickly got it open, the door sliding upwards with a metallic hiss. Cloud took a slow breath to focus himself and then walked into the small cell.

It was very small, about two times three meters only, with a steel bunk along one wall with only the bare minimum of cushioning on it and a single, white-blue lamp above him. Tifa was currently lying on the bunk, having propped herself up with one elbow when hearing the sound and now looking at him. Her eyes were cold, unfriendly..She didn't say anything, making Cloud even more unsettled. He had to do it, for her sake if nothing else, but where would he even start?

"The Ancient is back with Shinra." he said eventually, seeing no response from Tifa. "Avalanche is more or less annihilated in the slums, your casualties are in the hundreds. You failed in your mission. It's over for you."

"Did you just come here to gloat?" Tifa asked now, showing no despair despite the situation. Instead she got off the bunk and stood up, eliminating that small, psychological advantage Cloud had had. Cloud almost flinched at her glacial tone. Even now, when having lost completely, she stood with pride and conviction, a sight that only made Cloud feel even worse.

"No." he said, this was going straight to hell wasn't it? And why did he even keep his helmet on. He had to go from there. "I'm here because when we first met I didn't believe my eyes." he reached up now, grabbing hold of his helmet. "Of all the people I'd have expected to see in Avalanche," he now took it off, feeling as if it was the hardest thing he ever had done. He was terrified as he pushed it off his head, revealing his face. "I never expected to see you." he finished, watching how Tifa's face changed from hostility to pure shock.

It started in the eyes, eyes that had been narrowed and now shot wide open. Like an explosion, the effect of the shock spread through her features, the shockwave wiping away the furrows from her brow and pushed her eyebrows up towards her hair. It strained the skin of her cheeks as it pushed her mouth wide open. .

Next, in the wake of the explosion, came the pain. Her eyes moved from their empty, shocked state to one overflowing with pain, the furrows came back and her mouth slowly closed and opened again as her head began to move from side to side.

"No..." she whispered, her voice shivered in disbelief, just like her body. Indeed, the shock was so massive that she lost her footing, sinking down to her knees helplessly. Tifa stared up at him, the pain in her eyes and the shock and despair now overwhelming. All her composure had been torn to shreds and defiance was now an impossibility. "Cloud..." she whispered his name with a voice so broken, so filled with despair, that Cloud for a moment only wanted to walk up to her and comfort her. In the face of his childhood friend's pain his duty for a second became so irrelevant and Cloud felt the self-hatred flare up even more now than before. He kept his composure however, it was the hardest thing he ever had done, but he did.

"Tifa." he said with his composure frayed, but holding. He had to stop however. It was too much for him, if he had said anything more he would have broken down. So he was quiet, leaving room for Tifa to speak again.

"How are you..." she began, her voice breaking and stopping. "Why?" he continued after a while, "I looked for you, we... we hacked Shinra's records... you weren't there." Cloud was so distraught that he didn't even register the implications of what she had said. At the moment, all he wanted was to puke. Instead, he mentally pushed away, desperate to reach the real reason for why he was here.

"That's not why I'm here." he told her, clinging to his professionalism desperately. "You're done for Tifa. Soon you'll either be dead or locked up in Shinra's super-prison. Either way, your life as you know it has ended." Tifa only stared at him, breathing unevenly as the tears were forming in her face. "But it doesn't have to be that way." Cloud said now, giving emphasis to the sentence. "I don't know why you fell in with Avalanche, but you don't have to die along with them."

"What... what do you mean?" Tifa fought to regain her composure, fought desperately, Cloud could see that and he gritted his teeth for a few seconds. .

"The president trusts me." he said, "Enough that I can cut a deal with him. I can get you out of here Tifa, I can get you far away from both Avalanche and Shinra, somewhere where you can stay out of this whole thing, Mideel or something. You can live out your life in peace there, you don't have to die here." First now Tifa showed something else than despair. Strangely however, the look of distant hope in her eyes was even more painful for Cloud. He hadn't told her the catch yet. "That is..." he continued now, "If you work with us, tell us everything you know about Avalanche."

It switched now, the look on Tifa's face. From hope and that visage of... what should he call it, joy? Affection for him? Gratitude and happiness over how he had come to save her? It all vanished, being replaced with anger. Tifa got to her feet now, unsteadily but still, and before Cloud could bring himself to do anything she had slapped him in the face. Cloud felt the sting on his cheek but it was nothing compared to the pain inside. He took the blow silently, his head being thrown to the side but turning back to look at her soon after that. Tifa's eyes were still filled with tears, tears that had begun to carve trails down her cheeks, yet the anger was there as well and she panted now with her teeth bared, the rage was evident.

"How dare you..." she said with a shivering, furious voice. "Do you think you can make me betray my friends just like that!?" she almost hyperventilated and Cloud silently looked at her, forcing himself to not look away. Tifa eventually pulled back for another slap and Cloud raised his hand to grab it, making her tear away from him.

"What if I include Marlene?" he asked now, begging for Tifa to accept. The little daughter of Barret still weighed on his mind. If Tifa left Avalanche and helped them she could take Marlene with her. The little girl would know her, trust her, and would have as good a home with Tifa as she ever could get as it was. It was the best possible deal Cloud could think of and he begged silently for Tifa to accept it. Said young woman had frozen now, staring at him with shock in her eyes.

"Marlene?" Tifa didn't believe her ears it seemed.

"She was with the Ancient when we retrieved her." Cloud said, "Right now she's with Shinra's Child Services and if anything, she'll end up in an orphanage somewhere." Now Tifa's eyes changed, showing rage.

"You..." she started, "You bastard!" she hissed, Cloud once again feeling the pain of the entire situation keenly.

"You can have her." Cloud said. "Take her, go far away from Avalanche and never go back to it. You can live your life in peace there, raising Marlene to a happier life! Her father will die for what he's done but that doesn't mean she has to lose everyone that matters to her as well! And you can have her, give her a future, if you'll just cooperate with us!"

Tifa's face now showed the entire cavalcade of emotions. Pain, anger, despair, uncertainty, fear and countless other things. His childhood friend slowly shook her head, took a step back, paced. Cloud could see the struggle in her and in the end she turned away from him, putting her hands against the wall of the far end of the room and leaned against it. Tensing her entire body, her fingernails turning white as she dug her fingers into the wall the girl spoke.

"No." she said, pressing the word out through clenched teeth. Cloud startled at this, looking at her back in shock and disbelief. Tifa was slowly shaking her head, still not looking at him. "I won't do it. I won't sell everyone out."

"Then I can't guarantee what happens to Marlene." Cloud told her. His voice was even but inside he raged. Damn her! Why didn't she accept!? She had to!

"Don't you dare to make me the bad guy!" Tifa snarled as she spun around now, glaring at him. Cloud was struck by it now, as her hair spun around her and she glared at him with eyes filled with anger and indignation, how entrancing she was. He had even back then thought of her as pretty, but now... she had matured so well, had become a stunner of a beauty. And she was a terrorist... she hated him... and she would not accept the only salvation he could give her. "You're the one who's bargaining with a little girl!" Tifa snarled, "I don't know who you are any more but you'll never make me betray my friends!"

Cloud could see it. It was hopeless. She was dead set on her path. He remembered that look from many years ago, when she had decided that come hell or high water, she'd get over mount Niebel. Then like now, Cloud had no other option but to accept and he slowly nodded.

"So be it." he said, turning around and walking out. He stopped in the doorway however, looking back at her. She was still glaring at him, her fists clenched and her teeth bared in anger. Putting on the helmet again, he couldn't stop these last words. "I didn't become Soldier..." he said, "But I really did want to fulfil my promise." With that, he slammed his hand on the door panel, closing the door and making the automatic locks engage with a loud click. Marching away at high pace, Cloud none the less only barely made it to his room and got the door closed before he broke down. He threw his helmet into the wall, snarling with anger, frustration, grief and countless other emotions. His clenched fists pounding against the walls impotently. Cloud's desperate attempt to soothe the pain inside him had backfired and only worsened it. The recently promoted colonel of Commando cut a wretched, broken figure as he pounded the walls with his fists in deep frustration, in helpless anger and soul-wrenching guilt and pain.

\------xxxxxx------

In the wake of the massive raid into the slums and the successful interception of Avalanche's assassins, the Shinra were understandably somewhat lax in security. Things had not yet been restored to how they were before, leaving several gaping holes in the security of the building. That was the reason the three figures could move through the more shadowy corners of the Shinra building, escaping detection. At least that was half the reason. The figures all moved with incredible speed, superhuman agility and precision and completely soundlessly, all of them

"Aww, so boring." one of the three commented airily as they snuck past the statue-filled room where Avalanche's three assassins had been stopped, leaping from statue to statue at blinding speeds and complete silence. "I was hoping for some more fun. There's hardly anyone here."

"Shinra only thinks of Avalanche." another commented as they snuck up the stairs. "They think they're safe now... but what a surprise they will get." his face parted in a wide, maniacal grin as he thought of it.

"I can't wait..." the third said, his voice shivering with childish eagerness. "We'll destroy this entire place!" he clenched his fists, raising one to his face as he seemed to happy for words. "We'll be with father at last. After all these years."

"And then..." the second one said as they exited the stairs, following the beckoning call that resounded in them. "We'll find mother too. They took her, but they won't keep her!" running behind a pair of guards, the trio crept ever closer and closer to their goal. It pounded in their very souls, had done for as long as they had existed. And it only increased in intensity as they came closer and closer.

As they moved through one more of the floors a spiky haired man was standing by a vending machine, currently impatiently slapping the side of it. Zack growled to himself irritated at the bloody thing's reluctance to give him the damn soda he already had paid for. With Aerith safe once more he nevertheless found himself annoyed. He hadn't gotten hold of Cloud after the man came back from the raid and despite everything Zack was happy Aerith was safe. At least as safe as could be with that damn Hojo.

Zack had already gone to see Aerith, making sure to threaten Hojo with bloody murder unless he let her out of the glass cell he had put her in. His girlfriend had been devastated however, even though she didn't tell him anything she made Zack more and more uncertain. He leaned against the machine now, tormented by the entire situation. Shinra only seemed more and more evil these days while Aerith, his life and love, seemed only to sympathise with Avalanche. And where did that leave him? He had his honour, had always strived to follow it, and Shinra more and more became like honourless beasts. Even Cloud... his best and truest friend, had started to act outright ruthlessly. Zack didn't know what to do. Abandon Shinra? Could he? Really? No... he couldn't make Cloud his enemy. Cloud wouldn't betray the Shinra, not after all they had done for him.

Zack was snapped out of his thoughts when something zipped by to his left. Startling, he snapped his head to the side yet saw only an empty corridor intersection. He had felt somehow however. Getting to his feet, the Soldier pulled his buster sword from his back and moved down the hallway. Looking to both sides, he found himself having forgotten about the soft drink. Something was here...

\------xxxxxx------

Hours had passed and it was deep in the night when Cloud, who lay on his bed curled up in foetal position, was roused out of his grief and guilt-induced torpor. An explosion suddenly resounded through the building, distant but very much noticeable and to Cloud it was a wake-up call of the first order. He was on his feet in an instant, his helmet already torn from the floor and put on his head. Opening the door, Cloud walked as fast as he could down the hallway as the helmet linked up to the security channels already before the alarms began to sound.

"What's the situation!" he yelled the very instant he was in contact. His voice would now echo through the main security central, impossible to not notice. A few seconds later a voice answered.

"Some kind of explosion sir!" the man on the other end answered. "It came from 67th floor, the labs. Cameras' down and the fire alarms have gone off."

"Send in teams at once!" Cloud snapped, his earlier grief forgotten. Duty had appeared for him to perform. Something had happened, something bad, and Cloud found himself once again in the comforting, familiar embrace of his job. It all became so easy when he as captain, now colonel, of Commando had one goal only, Shinra's safety and success.

"Got it sir." the man answered, "Squad five are on the way. They'll reach the labs in a minute."

"Lock down the building." Cloud ordered now, "Get every man on station, full security. Who were in the labs at the time?"

"Only professor Hojo and some scientists." he was told, "the board is currently on the floor above however."

"Get, them, out, of, there!" Cloud snapped. He wasn't going to take chances. What the hell had happened in the labs?! "Secure the stairwells and escort them down!"

"Yes sir." his orders were acknowledged. "Squad five is about to enter the labs in ten seconds."

"Link me." Cloud said, reaching the armoury and grabbing a rifle and a sword both. The frequency changed, making him hear only static for a second before he was in contact again. "This is captain Strife." he said, watching as Commandos came running from all other directions. His men were already in high gear, as they should be, and Cloud motioned for them to follow him. "Enter the floor and tell me what you see." he commanded.

"Squad five copies." the deep voice of squad five's leader said and Cloud could hear the sound of a door opening. As he climbed the floors towards the security hub, he listened to the updates. "Hallway is empty." the sergeant said over the radio. "Something's torn down the light fixtures... There's sparks showering down from above. Light's weak, switching to darkvision."

"Any signs of the explosion?" Cloud asked tensely. What had happened?

"None." the sergeant said. "We're moving into the labs now."

"What do you see?"

"Planet have mercy..." the sergeant said, his voice slow, awed. "Something's ripped half the main chamber to pieces. There's a body at the door... an assistant, he's lost his head." Cloud could tell the man was spooked.

"Stay calm sergeant." he said, trying to make the man calm down. "I need you to stay focused. Keep going, let me know what you see.

"Yes sir." the man said, having regained some courage it seemed. "We're moving deeper into the labs now, approaching the vat chambers."

"Any signs of professor Hojo?" Cloud asked. He disliked the man but if he was dead Shinra would have lost their most valuable scientist.

"None." the sergeant said, "Entering the vats... the vats are all broken... there's some kind of... liquid covering the floor." the sergeant was interrupted now by how one of his men screamed. "What was that!?" making the sergeant give up a surprised sound and for a few seconds Cloud didn't get anything.

"What's going on?!" Cloud had now reached the central security hub, ten floors below the labs, and the chaos was total here, shutting off his microphone, he began to yell out orders in all directions, getting the Shinra troops into some kind or order.

"There was something that ran past in the shadows." the sergeant said. "There it is... oh planet..." the man said breathlessly, Cloud hearing a "what the fuck is that thing!?" from some other trooper before a roar came from whatever they saw, a hoarse, screeching roar that made the hairs on the back of Cloud's neck stand on end. "Fire!" The sergeant roared and the roar of automatic fire kicked in, Cloud only hearing screams and gunfire after this. Gritting his teeth, he activated the mic again.

"What the hell is going on up there?!" he yelled, the sergeant's answer panicked.

"Monsters!" the man screamed, "the entire floor is filled with monsters!" Another voice coming, "Sarge!" someone yelled, They got Vic!" A curse came over the channel and the sergeant roared, "Fall back, fall back!" he screamed, and the gunfire died off, being replaced with fearful panting as the squad ran.

"Sergeant!" Cloud roared, the fools! They'd be easy pickings if they didn't fall back in an orderly fashion! "Stop running! Fall back calmly! You have to keep them suppressed! You can't run or you'll be..." the channel was cut now, Cloud heard a terrified scream, an inhuman roar, and then the line went dead. Cloud felt a stab of anger now. Anger and fright. He patched into the main lines again.

"VIP escorts, abort!" he yelled, he couldn't risk taking the president down that way! "Get them to the top floor! We'll send choppers to extract them from there!" Cloud turned to the rest of the staff now "Evacuate 69th, 68th and 66th floor." he commanded, "upwards and downwards respectively. I want gunships and drones in the air around that floor and full video surveillance of the windows. Barricade the stairs, use furniture if you have to! Full combat gear and I want every damn peacekeeper available on station now! And get hold of Zack!" Leaving the room, he used a small pocket computer to synch his helmet up more properly to the Shinra security network. Dozens of symbols appeared all around him, showing an outline of the entire defence as it formed above him. His helmet computer hacked for a bit, needing several seconds to catch up with the mass of data that was dumped into his HUD. Patching himself into the Commando channels, he came in full contact with all one hundred of his men, the Shinra elite, Commando. He now spoke directly to the three platoons under his command..

"All units, report in." he said.

"First platoon assembled!" the young, driven lieutenant of first platoon, Mary Leroh, native of Junon sounded off. "We're at sixty-third floor, moving up along the stairs." Mary was in many ways the heart of the unit. Driven, loyal and imaginative, the daughter of a fisherman was also one of the best swordsmen, or swordswomen he supposed, Cloud had seen, ranking only Zack and, barely, himself above her.

"Second platoon assembling." this lieutenant was much more sombre. The dark-skinned Raemon da Vasca had always been number two to Cloud in many aspects, always having been beaten by him by an inch in the promotions. Cloud always wondered if the man resented him but the Costa del Sol native never stopped being professional. "Fortieth floor, we'll be ready in thirty seconds."

"Third platoon assembled and in position, sixty-sixth floor." lieutenant Suder Hein said now. The man was the single most efficient person Cloud knew, a machine in action. The things that stopped the northerner from advancing further was his complete lack of imagination and his almost overly succinct manner of speech. Counter-intuitively, he was the minimum allowed length and quite scrawny as well rather than the brute many expected of him.

"First platoon." Cloud said, "head for the hangar, I want you to get the president and the board out of the building and secure the floor. Don't let any of those things, whatever they were, past you."

"You got it captain!" Mary responded enthusiastically. "They won't be getting past us." Cloud almost smiled to himself. Mary's enthusiasm was infecting at times.

"Second platoon." he continued, "Get to position as soon as possible. Third platoon, spread out amongst the barricades, one fire team at each corridor!" Each of his platoons had thirty-two Commandos in them, meaning four eight man squads which each consisted of two fire teams. Also, the building had eight different corridor leading out from the lab toward the stairs that still were open. The ones inside had been sealed off. Four Commandos for each corridor should be enough. Whatever had been up there, it'd spread. For now, containment was the top priority. When second platoon caught up they could go on the offensive. Also... Cloud's radio started buzzing for a second as the frequency was forcibly changed on it. The gruff, angry voice of the president came over the air.

"What the hell is going on colonel?!" the man asked, his voice somewhat huffed, as if he was walking rapidly.

"Something happened in the labs sir." Cloud said, idly noticing that the man had remembered his promotion. "A squad was sent to investigate but something attacked them. We're barricading the floor around the lab at this time and as soon as Commando is assembled we'll hit back."

"Damn it!" the president swore. Cloud continued.

"A platoon of Commando is en route to you via helicopter. We'll extract you from the top floor while my men seal off the labs from above."

"The Ancient was in the labs!" the president hollered now as Cloud reached the 67th floor where the chaos was total. Terrified office workers and secretaries were running down the stairs and heavily armed peacekeepers ran up them, gunfire and roars audible from the floor Cloud came out into now. Despite the ruckus the men had responded with admirable quickness, Cloud seeing desks being torn over, file cabinets dragged out and all sorts of things being stacked into barricades by Shinra's armed forces as their squadmates fired their guns down the hallway towards the labs. He could see strange figures moving in the shadows and while he didn't see them clearly one thing was obvious, they were not human. Lieutenant Hein met him by the barricades, saluting him as Cloud held up a hand to stop him from talking. "I order you to attack at once!" the president roared in Cloud's ear. "I don't care what the costs are, if she dies we'll lose billions!" Cloud gritted his teeth. If they didn't secure the floors here there might be a massacre! Didn't he care at all about that?! Yet, it was an order wasn't it?

"Roger that sir." he said over the gunfire, "We'll attack as soon as possible." he said, the president cutting him off.

"Now colonel!" he roared. "Unless your men are charging into those labs within ten seconds I'll have your ass busted down to private!" Cloud gritted his teeth, looking at his lieutenant to see if the man had heard him. He had and the man nodded, making a gesture asking if he should summon the troops.

"Got it sir." he said grimly, "We'll commence the attack at once." Cutting off the channel, Cloud patched into the general frequencies. "All available peacekeepers to the 67th floor." he said, "Commando will raid the labs on the president's orders, all available peacekeepers to the barricades. Lieutenant Leroh, are you in the air?"

"Yes sir!" the lieutenant's voice yelled through a cacophony of gunfire and engine roars, "But there's a lot of chop here! There's some kind of winged... things all around us! 67th floor's windows are all broken and these things are swarming out. We're keeping them off us at this time and will be with the president in two minutes!"

"Don't attempt to extract the president." Cloud said now, he wasn't going to risk having the president's helicopter torn out of the air. "Not while the air is filled." What was going on? What the hell had Hojo been keeping in those labs?! Mary gave another affirmative and Cloud turned to lieutenant Hein. "Gather up the men." he said, "We strike from the east side and move west, that way we'll squeeze them upwards and into Leroh's force."

"Yes sir." Hein said and Cloud changed channel.

"Da Vasca, get your men here now! We are ordered to attack!"

"Yes sir, already on the way!" Cloud was satisfied enough with that answer and switched frequency again.

"This is captain Strife." he said, until his promotion was taken care of it didn't exist to him. Having patched into third platoon's frequency he addressed them directly. "the president has ordered us to go in and secure the Ancient no matter what. Keep on your toes men, whatever is in there took out a squad of peacekeepers in seconds. First priority is the Ancient, rescuing other survivors are a secondary objective. Stay tight and move fast, move!" One of the squads had linked up with him and Cloud raised his gun as he fired up his multi spectrum goggles and headed down the corridor towards the barricades. Loading the rifle, he cocked it and raised it just in time for a swarm of things to come around the corner towards him.

They were monstrous, all of them. Several metres tall, headless and with long, swollen arms, one adorned with spindly claws and the other with a giant club. Instead of a proper head they had only large tufts of fur on the head and a gaping, massive maw for shoulder. Also, a veritable swarm of scuttling bug-like things, the size of a dog each, scurried along their feet. The peacekeepers by the barricades froze in shock but Cloud only sneered to himself and raised his gun as he and his men took up position on the barricades.

"Fire!" he commanded and they all opened fire. The swarm of monsters coming at them were like a tidal wave, too numerous to count, but it availed them nothing. The nine Commandos fired, their guns going off fast enough that one would think it was fully automatic fire. It wasn't. Each shot was perfectly aimed and squeezed off by one pull of the trigger each, hitting the monsters to devastating effect. The giant monsters went down one after one, dropping like flies in the face of the onslaught. The smaller ones kept coming but as his team all as one had emptied their clips Cloud leaped over the barricades. With the monstrous swarm of bugs only a few metres from him, he clenched his hand and summoned the magic. Putting all his power into it, he thrust the hand forwards, the blast of fire he unleashed massive. It shot forwards, reducing every last thing in front of him to ashes in a few moments and to the sound of a collective, almost deafening shriek. When the fire died out, all that remained was a blackened, soot-covered corridor with ashes everywhere. "Advance!" he commanded, raising his gun again and making his way through the ash-strewn corridor. Reaching up to his helmet, he tuned in lieutenant Leroh again.

"This is captain Strife," he said rapidly ,"What is your status lieutenant?"

"We've fort... the antecham... to...ent's office." the lieutenant said, her voice breaking up. Cloud gritted his teeth. On top of everything the comms were starting to break up. He could only barely make out what she was saying "...thing is trying to... it's way... the door." she continued, Cloud able to hear the tension in her voice "It's tear... three inches... steel!" Cloud gritted his teeth. Evidently something big had gone upwards and he hastened his steps. His goggles illuminated the darkness perfectly despite the lack of normal light, meaning he had no problem picking out the monsters wherever they appeared. And there were a lot of them, dozens upon dozens of countless different things crawled all around him, towards him, against him, in all directions. Cloud reloaded and raised his gun before starting to shoot.

"What the hell were you doing here Hojo?" Cloud asked to himself as they moved deeper into the monster-infested chambers to a steady song of gunfire, screams and explosions. There seemed to be a veritable army of things here, an army from the nightmares of man. The chaos and destruction was utter. Bodies, monster and human both, lay everywhere and only more and more joined them. What more, claw marks, spent shell casings and the blast marks of materia were already all over the place. A furious fight had been taking place here earlier, the very walls were broken at places.

"Fifth squad didn't do this." lieutenant Hein said as they approached to main laboratory chamber. Cloud silently agreed, it would take much more than a group of peacekeepers to do this. What had happened here? Amongst the broken furniture, puddles of blood and other things along with corpses that only became more and more numerous they advanced. Eventually, with the first rooms cleared, they stacked up by the door to the main labs. Cloud looked at his men, seeing that they were all focused.

"Breach!" he commanded and they burst in through the doors, adrenaline pumping in them as they aimed to gun down everything in the chamber. However it was empty of life. The devastation was just as total here, the corpses everywhere. Yet, not one living person or even thing. Amongst the broken computers, shattered displays and glassware and ravaged furniture there was only death. Cloud motioned for his men to move up and they began to search through the labs, spreading out and moving in squads as they rapidly secured the battlefield that it had become. The Commando captain soon entered the containment room with one of the fireteams, seeing that whatever had been contained there had ripped its way out of the containers, violently. Still no monsters however. Cloud lowered his weapon now, walking through the chamber.

The centerpiece of the room was a large metal container where most of the front was torn away.. This was different however, Cloud's eyes narrowed as he walked up to it, noticing that the cuts were way too clean to have been made by claws or brute force. The front was cut away, cleanly, by a precise and perfectly aimed blow. The cut away section lay on the floor in front and Cloud grabbed it, turning it over to see if it revealed anything. It did, and it made him freeze in fear and shock.

On the section a brass plate was fitted, one that read in large letters: "Subject: Sephiroth" along with a date, said date being three days after the Niebelheim incident. Cloud dropped the plate as if it was hot, suddenly having began to tremble. Sephiroth... Sephiroth had been here all this time?! And what was worse... he was free! A call from one of his Commandos made him startle and look back over his shoulder. One of the men were standing in the doorway, nodding for him to come with him.

"Sir, we found a survivor." he said. Cloud swallowed.

"The Ancient?" he asked and the man shook his head.

"Professor Hojo." he answered and Cloud followed him, coming into one of the experimentation chambers to find Hojo sitting inside a glass container in the middle of the room. The ponytailed, bespectacled man sat with his legs crossed and was writing something in a noteblock. He looked up as Cloud came near. He had a contemptuous look on his sunken face.

"Took you long enough." he said dryly as Cloud came up, "Kindly get me out of this container if you please. I had to seal myself in here to not be eaten." Cloud gritted his teeth now, feeling the surge of anger in him almost overwhelming him. He walked up to the container and smashed the security glass with one blow of his fist. Hojo jumped backwards inside the chamber as the glass shattered and nearly hit him. "That's one way I suppose..." he said snow but was cut off when Cloud grabbed hold of him

"What were you doing here?" Cloud asked, his voice low but furious. "Sephiroth. I saw Sephiroth's chamber. He was here? What the hell have you been doing here?!" the Commando captain continued, his voice shivering with fear and anger both.

"I do not answer to you, grunt" Hojo said calmly, unperturbed by Cloud's seething anger. "Let me go at once. Also I'd suggest you get to the top floor at once. I don't know where Sephiroth and his people went, but Avalanche is loose as well, and they headed upstairs." Cloud went cold once more at this and what more, a memory hit him with all the force of a battering ram.

He remembered several years ago, during the mission to Niebelheim where Sephiroth, his once idol, had gone insane. Hojo had been performing cloning experiments at the local mako reactor, wanting to create new types of lifeforms. Leakage from the plant had caused monsters to appear and two Soldier along with a squad of Commando has been sent to investigate. It had been Sephiroth, Zack and Cloud's squad. He had just gotten out of training and been promoted to sergeant after his performance during it.

However, at the reactor a throwaway question from Zack had made Sephiroth freeze in horror before suddenly going berserk, wreaking havoc in the reactor before he had retreated to the basement of the Shinra mansion in Niebelheim. The man had suddenly come to question his humanity when confronted with the so called "makonoids" in the reactor. Digging through the archives of professor Gast, the only father figure Sephiroth had only had, he had arrived at a demented conclusion: That he was a clone, equal parts human and Cetra. He was a mix of professor Gast's genes and a being code-named JENOVA. Cloud still didn't know what exactly JENOVA was, however Sephiroth had learned enough.

Over the course of several days he had gone more and more insane, it had culminated when he burst out of the chamber, cutting down the Commando posted by the door and stalked towards the exit of the manor. Cloud shuddered to think of what would have happened had he gotten out of there. Zack and Cloud's squad had managed to stop him, however it had been barely, at a desperate gamble, and Sephiroth had been confused, starved, exhausted and sleep-deprived. It still haunted him in his nightmares, his battle in that burning mansion and Sephiroth's ravings. He was an Ancient he had said, Zack, Cloud and the others were traitors who had abandoned the Ancients and killed them, their entire species carried that guilt according to Sephiroth. And these traitorous vermin, had taken the Ancient's world from them, would suffer.

It clicked together instantly, the pieces combining to a conclusion more horrifying than anything he could imagine. If Sephiroth came into contact with Avalanche... Cloud found himself frozen cold, pure abject horror at the thought. Already Avalanche was a brutal and resilient enemy of Shinra, if they managed to draft Sephiroth into their demented war... Cloud turned around, heading for the stairs within seconds at full speed.

"Secure this floor Hein!" he yelled, seeing Raemon's platoon coming up from the stairs. "Da Vasca! With me, get up to the president, move, move!" Cloud had already gotten past the surprised platoon but Da Vasca was on his tail in an instant. Cloud desperately activated his communications equipment again, tuning in first platoon's frequency. "Lieutenant, report!" he yelled as he flew up the stairs, being met with only silence. "Lieutenant Leroh! Are you there!?" Cloud yelled desperately. "Mary!" he screamed now, half leaping up the stairs and out of them towards the antechamber. "Anyone! What's happening up there?!"

"So her name was Mary." a voice said on the other end, making Cloud freeze in terror. A deep, melodious yet firm voice spoke on the other end. It was amused, taunting him. "I saw some techniques reminiscent of yours in her swordplay." the voice continuing. Raemon and the platoon had stopped behind him. The lieutenant came up to him, asking what they were going to do. Cloud could only stand still however, paralysed with fear. ."A student, perhaps?" the voice continued, "A friend? A lover?" the voice spoke slowly, jeeringly .

"You..." Cloud began, unable to say anything more than that. The horror held him in such a tight grip, choking him, that Cloud couldn't move. A chuckle came from the other end, a chuckle that resounded in his blood, in his bones, in his very being.

"Yes." the voice said smugly. "Please, do hurry to get here. You're missing the great reunion. My little brother has told me a lot about you." Cloud felt a strange feeling in his guts, the bastard child of relief and fear. What he had feared had come true, there was no other explanation. His thoughts went to the Sephiroth lookalike and his words about brother. It fit together perfectly even though he did not want to and while the uncertainty vanished what came in its place was even worse. Slowly reaching up, almost as if in trance, he shut off the comm equipment. It didn't matter... nothing mattered. Sephiroth... his "brother," the monsters, any and all who challenged Shinra, they'd die. Cloud broke into sprint again, checking his gun as he ran. Activating his microphone again, he connected to the hub.

"Where is Zack?!" he hissed. Now more than ever they needed his friend, he needed him. He begged for them to have found him, that his friend was on his way, that Shinra's only loyal Soldier would be with them!

"We haven't located him yet sir." the officer on the other end said. Cloud swore. Where the hell was he!? Why?! Why now of all times!? "He was last seen on 66th floor, before the explosion. After that we've got nothing." Cloud felt a lump in his stomach of anger and disappointment. Where was he!? Yet, as he bust into the 69th floor, Cloud only gritted his teeth. He had to do it. Sephiroth would be on the top floor, yet he had to do it. The president and board would be up there, he had to do it!

The door to the antechamber to the president's office was devastated, torn open by brute force, and inside the opulent room was an utterly horrifying scene. Around the chamber the entire first platoon lay, dead every last of them. They had been crushed, cut to pieces, pierced, blood flowed freely from the corpses of his Commandos. Cloud froze in his steps, looking around the chamber in shock as he entered. The sight horrified him even in the mentally desperate state he was in. His men! What had happened?! A full third of all Commandos that existed lay in front of him here, dead all of them!

"C-captain..:" the whisper was hoarse, nearly inaudible, but Cloud heard it. His head snapped to the side and he had broken into a sprint before he knew what he was doing. Reaching the stairs in seconds, he knelt by Mary Leroh's mutilated body. The lieutenant of the first platoon lay on the lowermost stairs, grievous wounds over her entire body, one arm was cut off and her torso was one big bloody mess. She was breathing quickly and shallowly, desperate gasps for air even as her body was too damaged to keep going for more than a few more seconds. "Sephiroth... he's here..." she coughed, blood running out of her mouth.

"It's all right lieutenant." Cloud said, trying to not have his voice shiver "focus on breathing." he whispered. "Medic!" he yelled at the men with him and one of them came up at once. Putting his hands on Mary's body, the man began to summon all the healing magic he could. Focusing on her lungs and heart, he tried to keep her alive, stabilize her. Mary's face had gone a deathly shade of pale and she slowly shook her head..

"I'm sorry captain..." she croaked. "I'm so sorry... I couldn't..." That was her last words. Her breathing slowly came to a stop and she died. Cloud, even amongst all the shock fear and pain he felt, nevertheless felt the passing of his lieutenant keenly. The ever cheerful and enthusiastic Mary Leroh was now gone.

Cloud remembered when he first had met her, two years after the Niebelheim incident. A young, seemingly childish girl who had walked up to the then lieutenant Strife the first thing she did and challenged him to a sparring duel. The ridicule had immediately started flowing from the rest of the team but Cloud had accepted the challenge, deciding to teach her a lesson in humility. The one to learn humility had been him however, Mary had been a whirlwind in combat, Cloud seriously having a hard time even following her. He had won, but it had been a wild shot that had surprised her.

He could still remember it keenly, the surprise in the girl's eyes when he had disarmed her and thrown her to the ground. She had looked up at him as if she couldn't believe it when he towered above her. Then, when he offered her a hand to help her up, she had only looked even more flummoxed, even embarrassed if the blush that had settled over her face was anything to go by. After that she had been one of his finest subordinates and when Commando had expanded from one platoon to one company Mary had been one of the three people Cloud had picked instantly to serve as lieutenants under him, the captain. And now... four years later... she was gone.

Reaching up, he slowly ran a hand over Mary's face to close her eyes. Cloud now gritted his teeth and looked back at the others. His teeth were gritted and the shock and horror became anger, rage, seething hatred.

"Move in." he said as he rose. "Guns ready, fire on sight." He was cold inside, cold rage filling him as he ran up the stairs with his men following him. With pounding boots they stormed the top floor, guns raised and eyes peeled. Commando moved with superhuman speed. Five seconds after they had first became visible the entire platoon was on the floor, having formed a firing line as they all aimed towards where the president would be. The deployment was amazing in its speed, before any normal being would have had even a chance to understand what had happened they all were in position, a firing line of over thirty Commandos, guns raised and ready to spew out a tidal wave of hot lead to drench the entire office. Cloud was in the middle of the line and instantly saw the scene in front of him.

Not one of his Commandos had gotten up here, they had stood their ground downstairs and died there. Instead, an equally horrifying sight could be seen in the room. Cloud was so far down mentally that he had dropped any and all feeling and went on pure duty and instinct. Yet he still couldn't stop the stab of horror in his guts when he saw the sight in the room. The president sat still in is chair, slumped forwards over his desk with a long blade, too long to be usable by any normal man, sticking out of his back. Cloud recognized it however, he'd recognize Sephiroth's Masamune anywhere. Sephiroth wasn't there however, neither he nor his "brother" was present. That, however, was the case for Zack. He stood by the other end of the room, by the window, and held Aerith in his arms. They both had turned to look towards him, Cloud blinking at the sight. What the hell was Zack doing here? And with Aerith? Cloud didn't become all too worried, there could easily be a lot of logical explanations for it. However, at the other end of that side of the room three other figures stood, the Avalanche members.

The president of Shinra was dead and Avalanche was here. Cloud was deep enough in his combat mindset that while the fact was shocking and painful both it did not stop him. Instead, with a mind almost inhumanly cold, he took stock of the situation and made the call. Two seconds after the Commando platoon had appeared Cloud gave the order.

"Avalanche! Take them down!" he roared. Not even thinking about Tifa any more, he did his duty and his platoon opened fire, letting loose a torrent of gunfire, lethally precise, high-calibre fire of the same kind that had mowed down an entire army of charging monsters. All in all over a hundred bullets were sent flying in a split-second against the Avalanche members who all had been caught flat-footed. Something that meant their fate was sealed.

At least, such would have been the case if Zack hadn't moved. The Soldier appeared between Avalanche and Commando, his buster sword whirling through the air as the giant sword blocked every last of the bullets. Cloud looked at the sight in disbelief, every single one of the bullets was swatted out of the air and Zack's blade came to a stop in front of him, held up almost like a shield.

"Cease fire!" Zack screamed, the Commandos instinctively obeying. Zack was, after all, the man they all had been drilled to work under and accompany. He was their knight and they the squires, their lord commanded and they obeyed. A ridiculous comparison perhaps, but it was the best way Cloud could think of it. Lowering his gun, he suddenly had the instinctive duty driving him challenged by his thinking self.

"What... what are you doing Zack?" Cloud asked in the silence that came. The Avalanche members had stepped back in shock and Aerith seemed like she was about to faint from the situation. Zack still held his blade up, Cloud noticing first now he had some smaller nicks and wounds.

"Avalanche isn't our enemy!" Zack said, putting down his sword. "Damn it Cloud, Sephiroth! He's on the loose! Look what he did to the president! Avalanche isn't our enemy any more!"

"That's not your call!" Cloud hissed. What was Zack doing!? He was defending Shinra's arch enemy! Cloud couldn't comprehend it, that was treason of the worst kind! People had been executed for less! If the new president heard of this... Cloud didn't dare to think about that. Zack would be discarded instantly! "Step away Zack." Cloud said now. "Put down your sword, get out of the way and hand over the Ancient!" Cloud was terrified now, having been ripped out of his focused mindset. Not that... not Zack as well. With all that was going on, Cloud felt like everything fell apart around him. Was Zack turning rogue as well?! No... no... please no. Not Zack too! Not after Mary's and first platoon's deaths!

"Damn it Cloud!" Zack began. Cloud could see it in his eyes. That word, "Ancient", had set him off. He was furious that his girlfriend was called such a thing. Cloud felt the anger like a punch in the guts but gritted his teeth. Duty, duty, he had his duty! If he just did his duty things would be fine. They were both military men, duty was paramount of them. If he just did it things would be fine! "Listen to me! You can't..."

"You don't get to decide that Zack!" Cloud said now, "Step away, hand her over and do your job!" he was screaming at the end, desperate, terrified. Zack couldn't go rogue! Zack only looked at him however, Cloud staring into his friend's eyes through his goggles, he could see Zack balancing on the edge, his eyes showing his struggle "Now!" Cloud yelled after a while, desperate for Zack to do his job, to not betray Shinra.

Then, Zack's sword moved. Swinging it in an arc, he slammed it into the ground and sent a shower of marble debris flying through the air along with a blast of magic. Cloud stared in horror at the sight, so shocked, so angered and so hurt that he couldn't even do anything before the shower of magic and stone had hit him and his men, throwing them all backwards. Cloud's feet lifted from the ground as a large chunk of marble hit him square in the chest, Cloud not even feeling the pain. He flew backwards several meters as if in slow motion. His mind screamed at him, tried to move again, but he was powerless to do anything. The sheer shock of what just had happened broke him. Cloud finally broke. His childhood friend was a terrorist, Sephiroth was loose, despite all the vicious things he had done he couldn't fix anything, a third of his men were slaughtered. And now... Zack, his mentor, closest friend, confidante, brother in arms, brother in all but blood... had betrayed Shinra... had betrayed him..When Cloud landed again, after what seemed like an eternity, something inside of him had shattered.

The chaos that broke out, a cacophony of sound, crashes, screams, thuds and other things, made him utterly confused . Cloud just lay there, blindly staring up at the roof as things calmed down, or at least stopped moving so much. There was still so much screaming. So much sounds... It was a near minute before he got back to reality. A sudden slap to the face made him snap back to reality to see Raemon kneel by his side. The dark skinned man was gritting his teeth.

"Sir!" he yelled, Cloud shaking his head as he sat up.

"Status report." he said almost absently. All of a sudden things seemed to different. He couldn't name or place it, but something was off... or was it in fact right? Whatever it was, things were different, deeply. Cloud found himself wanting to understand it.

"Fair and the terrorists leaped down to the streets!" Raemon said, sounding shocked and disbelieving. Cloud looked at him now. "They... I've never seen acrobatics like that, they leaped down the side of the building, managing to get down unharmed!" Da Vasca's face was a study in shock even though half of it was obscured by his goggles.

"Helicopters." Cloud said calmly, "Scramble every helicopter available, tell them to shoot to kill.

"Against Fair, sir?" Raemon was stunned by Cloud's words, he could tell that. He hadn't expected it had he? That Cloud would give such a ruthless order.

"Zack Fair just betrayed Shinra." Cloud said. It was so easy, totally effortless. All of a sudden it didn't matter that it was Zack. Nothing mattered now. It was like everything inside him had fallen apart, leaving only a clear, focused void in its wake. "He's an enemy to be shot on sight. Update all peacekeeper forces in the city, tell them he's to be killed on sight. Give chase in whatever way you can. Still: capturing the Ancient is first priority. Wound her if needed. Fair's and the terrorists' deaths are secondary to that." Cloud had been looking towards the other end of the room, seeing how part of the glass wall there had been broken where Zack and the others had leaped out. Now however he looked at his lieutenant. "Now." he said coolly, making Raemon instinctively salute and obey. .

Getting to his feet, Cloud walked over to the windows and looked down. Far below him the city of Midgar lay. He couldn't see or even get a hint to where Zack was but he was down there, with his new friends the terrorists. Suddenly Cloud almost wanted to laugh. The entire absurdity of the situation was so complete. What an utter catastrophe... Sephiroth and Zack both on the loose and the Ancient lost. Cloud already could tell where this would lead. Standing by the window, staring down at the city, the captain of Commando slowly shook his head.

Chaos... this would lead to chaos. And with Shinra's most vital asset and most precious specimen lost... it did not look good.


	5. Chapter 5

Shinra was shocked to a standstill by the death of the president. While it still stood firm the lumbering behemoth of a company came to freeze. No orders could be given since the head of the company was no longer with them. The president, who had led the company for three decades, was now taken away in an instant and to all too many the shock was like that of a family member's death. While perhaps not always loved, there were few who did not respect him or at least acknowledged the man's ability. What more, the carnage on the top floors of the Shinra building meant that there was total chaos there when dawn came. Commando kill teams searched every last corner of the floors for any straggler monsters and the cleaning crew had to be almost forced at gunpoint to enter the floors where a furious battle had raged only hours before. The medical wing of 56th floor, meanwhile, was filled with peacekeepers and Commando both. 

Cloud was one of these, an errant shard of marble had slit up his cheek when Zack had knocked them over and Cloud had been so distracted that he hadn't even noticed it before one of his Commandos had remarked that the left side of his face was covered in blood. As he sat on the footstool in the corner of a white room and let the doctor see to it he listened silently to what he said. The room he was in had all in all two dozen wounded people there, all being examined and treated by the doctors. The cut was deep, it had bounced off his cheekbone and the jagged edges had made any chances of a clean healing remote at best. While materia could patch him up decently it couldn't hide the end result. A long, deep red scar now ran across his cheek, right below his eye, and Cloud looked absently at the end result in the small mirror he had been handed. 

Running his finger along it, he tried to understand. How could Zack do it? Was that truly how it was in the end? To him, Zack had been the closest and truest friend possible. It had been they, the team of elites .Yet now... Zack had betrayed Shinra, attacked Cloud... all so that he could run away with his girlfriend to join Avalanche... Leaving his once best friend to grieve the death of one of his platoons. Cloud stared into the mirror now and all of a sudden, for a few seconds, he didn't feel empty anymore. A sudden, explosive rage filled him and he swung his arm, smashing the mirror into pieces. The people inside the large examining room he sat in all jumped from fright at this, all eyes turning to Cloud as he stood up, throwing the remnants of the mirror into a wall. 

Stalking towards the exit, Cloud didn't even stop when the doctor, who had walked to wash his hands, came up and tried to calm him down. Instead, in a fit of rage, he threw the man to the side, sending him half flying into a large locker. He ignored and indeed didn't even register the shocked gazes he was given and when he came out into the hallway he smashed his fist into the wall with a scream of frustration and anger. Panting hoarsely, he gritted his teeth and stared blindly into the air. Then, out of nowhere, the rage vanished as quickly as it had come and all of a sudden he wasn't angry any more, only... amused. Still leaning against the wall, Cloud found himself suddenly struggling with a fit of giggling. Putting one hand to his mouth, he tried to cover it up but it just wouldn't stop and Cloud started to laugh. He didn't know why and the fact that he all of a sudden was laughing only amused him even more. 

Zack was gone! He had betrayed Shinra! An entire platoon of Cloud's men were gone, having died at Sephiroth's hands to boot! And now that man was on the loose and would seek revenge, one way or another! Tifa was a terrorist! The president was dead! The Ancient was with Avalanche! Everything was as bad as it could be and he had lost everything! Cloud laughed at the entire situation, not knowing what else to do. Unsteadily and slowly, he laughed, his entire body shivering. 

A careful cough brought him out of his maniacal laughter and he startled, badly. In fright, he nearly leaped out of his skin and backpedalled from the wall and in the other direction before he could calm down. The yelp coming from the interrupter didn't help either. Cloud came face to face with a young woman in a deep blue suit. She had short blonde hair and stood with the kind of anxious formality that pegged her as a rookie in a second. The young woman flinched and made a stiff salute. 

“Captain Strife!” she began with a snap in her voice. Terrified of him, she nevertheless struggled to do what she was going to do. “I...” 

“Who are you?” Cloud asked, suddenly furious at the woman's appearance. He was still running on adrenaline and blind rage, she was the easiest target. The woman swallowed loudly. 

“Investigation Sector of the General Affairs Department, Agent Elena.” she began. Cloud found himself in a less than flattering mood and the girl became target of all his ire. Compared to the focused, amiable and competent Tseng, the ruthless but capable Reno and the stoic, dutiful Rude this trembling little schoolgirl seemed to him to be more like some crap attempt by a men's magazine to make a “Turks” series. She was built like a straw and fidgeted like a dog expecting the whip. To his mind the small amounts of makeup she wore seemed like a prostitute's gaudy face-painting and her youthfulness made him feel like he wanted to kick her out of Shinra and back to grade school or wherever the little whelp belonged. Atypical as it was for him to think like this, at the moment his anger needed an outlet and it came in the shape of her.

“Well?!” Cloud asked after a while of silence, the girl had lost what she was going to say from his outburst and it only infuriated Cloud even more. “Did you want something?!” the girl flinched again. 

“I...” she began, “I was sent to retrieve you, the president requests your...” she began, Cloud snapping now. In one second he had crossed the distance between them and grabbed her by the throat. That little bitch! The president was dead! Murdered! How dared she claim he wanted Cloud's presence?! Cloud just wanted to squeeze the life out of her now, like an irritating bug! He slammed her against the wall, the girl yelling out in pain as her head hit it and Cloud's hand tightening around her throat 

“The president is dead!” Cloud snarled, pushing his face up only inches from hers. “I saw his corpse! Who sent you!?” whoever had sent her would suffer! Cloud wanted to find whoever dared to claim the president's authority and kill him! The girl struggled against his grip, tried to push him away yet even with both hands she couldn't budge his hand clenching around her throat. She was turning redder and redder. 

“I...” she began with a choked voice, “The new... president...” 

“Who?!” Cloud roared into her face. 

“Rufus... Shinra...” the girl pushed forth, struggling to stay conscious. For Cloud it clicked right there. Rufus Shinra, the president's son. If anyone would assume command over Shinra it'd be him... Of course the president would testament the company to his only living child. “He just... flew in... asked me... to find you... top floor” the girl continued and Cloud let go of her, almost absently. The girl sunk down to the floor, coughing and wheezing as she held one hand to her throat, and Cloud didn't spare her a second look as he walked away from her. While the death of the president still was painful to him, the fact that a new leader was in place did matter to him. That... that meant they could act. That meant it was time to do something! He hastened his strides, suddenly eager to get to the president's office. In the end, he broke into a run, dashing through the empty corridors and towards the elevator. He had come to hyperventilate, pushing the button for the top floor repeatedly. The doors closed seemingly much slower than they used to and the ascent became excruciating, Cloud was pacing after only a few seconds. His mind was racing with possibilities and fears, what would happen now would be decisive. He had to know, what was the plan, what was Shinra going to do?!

When he arrived he shot out of the elevator before the doors had even opened fully, darting towards the stairs up to the president's office where a squad of peacekeepers were standing guard. The evidence of last night's battle were in many ways gone. While the craters still remained the scorch marks and blood was gone as well as the bodies of his massacred platoon. The memory kicked Cloud in the guts and he felt the anger bubble up. The peacekeepers stopped him however. 

“Excuse me sir.” one of them said, “the new president is meeting with the board at the moment. Cloud almost scoffed. The board... that collection of snivelling cretins that had hidden in one of the side rooms when the president died. Worse, they stopped Cloud from finding out what they were going to do which almost made him crazy. “He'll see you in a second.” the man said, sounding almost understanding. Stepping back, Cloud sighed and ran a hand through his hair. The presence of the peacekeepers made him avoid fidgeting however. His military training was almost second nature to him and he stood still, the anxiety and unease being ruthlessly squashed under a giant boulder of discipline and self control. 

There was nothing but duty, no traitorous brothers in arms, no childhood friends turned terrorist, nothing, but, duty. He was a weapon of Shinra, not a man, and where Shinra pointed him, he'd go. When they didn't need him, he'd perfect himself in his craft to be able to do his duty better for when they did. That was the long and short of it, the only thing he was. Even before this creed had emptied him, focused him, now however it almost felt like his soul, his identity, was poured into an endless abyss and left nothing intact. 

Cloud almost lost the time as he stood there, fighting to extinguish every trace of anger, of confusion and grief, of himself. When the board finally came down he hadn't moved in an hour. Almost absently he saluted Heidegger, who only gave him a glare that could break rocks in half. Scarlet only ignored him and Palmer was off in his own world. Reeve, however, gave him a solemn and respectful nod, holding his hand to his chest in a traditional gesture of respect for the dead. Normally Cloud would have been touched by his actions, now he didn't care. Instead, he walked up to the stairs and this time the peacekeepers let him past. 

Walking up into the president's office, he saw the man's inheritor. Unlike his father, Rufus Shinra was a young, vital man with short blonde hair and an immaculate white suit. He was standing by the window, the lithe, black-skinned beast Dark Nation at his feet. What more, beside him Hojo was standing and the two were conversing silently. Dark Nation looked up the same moment he showed up at the top of the stairs and Rufus noticed what his pet did. Looking up, he saw Cloud who saluted in response.

“Right on time captain.” he said, his voice deep, authoritative and confident. Cloud came up to him silently and the man smirked a bit. “What a night, wouldn't you say?” the new president of Shinra said with an almost amused voice. Cloud thought of all that had transpired and was angered by how flippantly the new president talked of it all. 

“That... is the least you can say.” Cloud eventually chose the diplomatic answer. The man was his superior after all. “Sir.” he added a split second after finishing. Rufus nodded as he pursed his lips. 

“Sephiroth himself on the loose, with friends to boot, and our best weapon to stop him goes rogue.” he said. “What would you advise?” he said suddenly, catching Cloud off guard. Cloud had thought about it, he just hadn't expected the man to ask. 

“Sir...” he began, “As we've seen, taking on Soldier-class fighters is suicide unless you have similar backup. A whole Commando platoon paid with their lives to show it...” he added bitterly. Lieutenant Leroh... Mary... once again he remembered the sight of his dead platoon. He'd avenge her and first platoon. One way or another he would. Rufus nodded. 

“Precisely.” he said, “I've already ordered the Turks to track our runaway rogues but when we find, them; what then?” Cloud admitted to himself that he didn't know. The Soldier program was suspended, Commando was the best they had at the moment. 

“Barring an eventual resumption of the Soldier project our best option is to corner them and strike with overwhelming numbers and force.” He said eventually. “The casualties will be high, but not even Sephiroth can fight forever.” what a disgusting solution. Human Wave tactics was the worst kind of fighting he knew, he hated the very concept. 

“Barring an eventual resumption...” Rufus quoted him, seemingly amused. Looking at Hojo, the man raised an eyebrow and Hojo pushed his glasses up the ridge of his nose before slowly nodding. “Fortunately, that's not a problem.” he said, turning back to Cloud. “Tell me, you originally applied for Soldier, did you not?” 

“Yes sir.” Cloud said. What was this? What had they been talking about?

“Then congratulations.” The man smiled, a wide, salesman type of smile. “the Soldier project is from this day on restarted and you are our first candidate.” Cloud blinked, speechless. Soldier? Soldier was restarted? It was....

“I...” Cloud began, unable to say anything more. It was impossible... he had buried that dream long ago, resigned himself to do all he could in Commando.... but now... he was to become a Soldier? The prospect was equally much exhilarating as it was terrifying and it stunned him. Cloud almost lost his posture and came to open and close his mouth like a fish. “Sir... I am...” 

“Allow me to point out that this is an order.” Rufus added, “As it is we are in bit of a pinch and I do hope you'll do your duty to Shinra.”

“Duty” and “Shinra”, two words that made Cloud instantly obey and he sharpened his posture. 

“Yes sir!” he said quickly with a snappy salute. “My only concern is that I wasn't suitable back then. Won't that be a risk?” 

“Professor?” Rufus said now, Hojo smirking. 

“You are implying I've been sitting on my hands these last years.” the man said. “the Soldier formula was crude, the first generations basically consisted of mako showers and cellular injections, is that a secret by the way?” he changed track here, turning to Rufus, who shook his head. “Good. The end products were unstable and often degenerated after some time. Sephiroth was the first stable specimen and even for him the creation process was crude, if potent. You, however, are different.”

“How so?” Cloud asked. His antipathy for Hojo was almost forgotten. He wanted, needed, to know. 

“For example you are already born.” the scientist said mysteriously. “What more, the mako exposure that was part in Commando's creation has worked your body ever since we put it in you. You are now a perfect base for further enhancements. The old Soldier creation process was crude, hard to control and unpredictable, my new creation, Neo-Soldier; are none of these things.”

“Neo-Soldier?” Cloud asked. What more... Hojo's words made him curious. “Forgive me, but was this planned from the start? You make it sound... as if Commando was a project to create templates.”

“It was.” Hojo admitted without concessions. “We wanted to see how the base enhancements worked over time, Commando was primarily a test group for these base enhancements. However Sephiroth's episode in Niebelheim and your performance made president Shinra decide to keep using you as you were.” 

“So... we were just guinea pigs?” Cloud asked, feeling rage bubble up inside him. Hojo sighed and rubbed his temple. 

“As I just said.” he said with some irritation. “With recent events proving what I said back then, that base templates won't be able to do anything against fully enhanced fighters, Shinra will now resume the creation of the next generation of super-soldiers.” Cloud now had three emotions inside him, eagerness and anxiety shared its place with anger. The idea that the unit that had been everything for him was just this asshole's playthings made him see red. He kept himself focused however, remembering his creed of duty. 

“When do we start?” he asked. He didn't care. Right now he didn't care about that. They might just be base templates but the “base templates” who had died this night still demanded he avenged them. Shinra's enemies still had to be destroyed. And if to do so he had to become what he once had been meant to be a model for how to create, so be it.

“Good to see you decide to be grown up about this.” Hojo said, Cloud ignoring him. “Right away in fact.” the man continued, “We leave for Junon in three hours.” 

“I'll eagerly await your return.” Rufus said amiably. “While we're at it. Do you have any recommendations for whom to assume command of Commando?”

“Lieutenant da Vasca.” Cloud said instantly. Lieutenant Hein had come as far as he could and Mary... was dead. He gritted his teeth. “May I also request something for the unit?” he asked. Even with his duty pounding in his ears he couldn't forget about that. Rufus motioned for him to speak and Cloud took a deep breath. “Please, do not recreate first platoon.” he said, the new president of Shinra raised an eyebrow at this. “Last night... Sephiroth cut out a piece of all our souls.” he said, “Even if it was recreated, it wouldn't be first platoon, not as we know it. Create a fourth platoon if needed, but please, let first platoon rest in peace. It can't be recreated, not truly, not after having been wiped out so utterly.” Cloud gritted his teeth after he had said it. He begged that the president would agree. He couldn't imagine what it would be like for those who'd come after Mary and her men, to try to fill those shoes. It wouldn't work, they'd only be resented as usurpers. Rufus folded his arms now and looked at Cloud, straight into his eyes. 

“Approved.” he said after a second, making Cloud almost collapse from relief. Thank the stars.... that left Mary and her platoon to rest in peace... as soon as he had avenged them. “However.” Rufus said, “In return, swear you'll destroy Sephiroth and Avalanche both. They challenged Shinra and must die for that. All who challenge Shinra must die.” Cloud acted almost on instinct, dropping to one knee and bowing his head. 

“I swear.” he said with a heartfelt voice. “They will die, as well as everyone who tries to challenge Shinra will. I will see to that or die. You have my oath on this, sir.” Right there Rufus earned his loyalty. His men were one of the few things he still had, to have the death of first platoon respected meant the world to him. 

“If we are done with the melodrama...” Hojo sighed, “I'd like to get underway with the enhancements soon. Neither Sephiroth nor Avalanche will rest on their laurels.” Cloud almost twitched with anger but said nothing. 

“Of course.” Rufus said with a smile. “Get to it immediately. Is one month enough?” 

“It will be tough but doable.” Hojo said as Cloud stood up. “With me then mister Strife... we have a lot to do. A lot to do indeed.” the man's voice was ominous as he walked towards the stairs. Cloud followed him in silence. He should have been overjoyed, his childhood dream had come true. He should have been furious, all he had done these years was nothing but one giant field trial for this man. He should grieve, Mary and a third of his brave men were dead. However, he was just empty. He walked almost like a man to his execution, preparing to leave everything he had behind in order to kill those he had lost. 

\------xxxxxx------

In the small mining village of Kalm, several hours by car north of Midgar, it was a sombre pair of people who sat in one of the rooms at the inn. Zack was sitting on the bed, leaning against the wall with his folded arms resting on his pulled-up knees. His face was like a thundercloud as he stared into the brown wall. Aerith sat on the bedside, her legs together and her hands clasped looking at her boyfriend with an uncertain look on her face. It was easy to see that she wanted to say something but did not find words. 

After their flight from Midgar, hounded as they had been by helicopters and motorcycle troops, they had only barely escaped their pursuers by leaping into a lake. The ninja girl, Yuffie, had used some weird tools to make them able to hide in the cold water and breathe. They had remained there for over an hour, hidden in the pitch black, cold water, before they could get out, Aerith had been almost unconscious from the cold then. First at noon the next day they had reached Kalm and could get an actual room at the inn there. Any thoughts Aerith had had about that things would get less nightmarish would end up thoroughly thrown out of the window. 

Zack had been in an utterly lousy mood and barely said anything, only stomping up to his room first he did, and the other Avalanche members hadn't been any more cheerful either. The big man, the leader Barret, had looked like he wanted to kill someone and one of the girls, Tifa, hadn't said a word, looking heart-wrenchingly miserable. Yuffie's attempts to cheer her friends up had been horrid enough that Aerith had to flee the scene, she literally couldn't bear to watch it. So here she sat now, next to her boyfriend who was currently trying to kill the painting across the room with his glares, he hadn't said a word to her. 

“Are you...” she began uncertainly, “Are you okay?” she didn't know what else to say. Zack turned to look at her, his eyes angry and frustrated. 

“Okay?” he asked incredulously. “No. No I am not okay.” Zack got off the bed now, walking over to the window. “I attacked Cloud!” he hissed as he stared out of the window. “What the hell is all this?” he asked now, leaning with his hands against the windowsill. “When did the world turn upside down? Only weeks ago everything was fine...” Her boyfriend gave up a tormented sound now, a groan of anguish. Aerith didn't know what to do, in the end she improvised. Walking up to him, she slowly tried to put her arms around him, however Zack stopped her, moving away from her embrace. “I... not now...” he said, “I... I need to be alone. Okay?” 

Aerith pulled back, looking at her boyfriend's back She felt angry now, not liking to be brushed aside. She was his girlfriend! Shouldn't she if anyone be here for him now? Yet, she chose to not say anything. Zack didn't need her starting to nag now. However, she still needed to do something, so she gave him a quick hug before pulling back. 

“I'll be downstairs...” she said softly, heading for the door out of the room. Zack nodded, still looking out of the window, and Aerith left the room and closed the door. Sighing deeply, she tried to work it over in her head. Even with the sweeter sides she had seen of Cloud, she still couldn't get why Zack was this broken up. As nice as Cloud had been, there was nothing beneath that exterior but a Shinra fanatic... or was there? Aerith couldn't make ends meet in this. 

She then noticed Tifa stand by the window at the end of the hallway. She was standing with her arms wrapped around herself as she looked out of the window, just like Zack. It made Aerith a bit curious. Before she, along with Barret and Yuffie, had gone into the Shinra building she had been confident and all smiles. After that, right until they had gotten to Kalm she had been cool, focused and not shown any hits of breaking down. When they arrived, however, she had broken nearly instantly. It had been like she had refused to feel, that whatever pained her could wait until they were safe... Aerith sighed, how much pain was her friends carrying after what had happened in that tower? What more, with Yuffie's attempts at comforting sucking so badly, she eventually decided to try to do something herself. 

Slowly walking up to the girl, Aerith racked her mind. What was she even going to say? She didn't have a clue on where to start. Never the less, she felt like she could at least do a better job than the ninja girl. Therefore, she came up to the other girl and put a hand on her shoulder. 

“Hey...” she began, Tifa looking back at her. Her eyes were red and tear trails had carved their way down her cheeks. She looked so incredibly miserable... 

“Y-your holiness.” she began, Aerith putting up one finger to her lips to cut her off. 

“It's Aerith.” she said. Were they gonna have to do this again? “Nothing more. Okay?” she said it gently, not wanting to scare the girl. She knew herself how timid one could become when sad and therefore smiled a bit. “Are you okay?” she asked now. The girl wiping her eyes quickly. 

“I... I'll be fine.” she said, forcing herself to not show her grief, however Aerith shook her head. 

“I didn't mean it like that.” she said kindly. “You need someone to talk to, I can tell.” 

“No I...” Tifa said, “I can't put my problems on your shoulders, I...”

“Says who?” Aerith answered, coming up a bit closer to her and putting a hand on her shoulder. “You saved my life, it's the least I can do.” 

“But I...” Tifa began, Aerith stopping her again. 

“Please.” she said, “Let me help you, nobody wins anything on suffering alone, okay?” 

They ended up seated inside the room they had gotten for the two Avalanche girls, Aerith sitting down by Tifa's side as the girl sat on the bed with her back against the wall and her legs up to her chest. Aerith sat on the edge of the bed, looking towards her. 

“Now, what's eating you?” Aerith began, Tifa sighing. 

“I don't know where to start...” she said, her voice breaking a little. 

“What about the beginning?” Aerith suggested. “I'll listen, I promise.” Tifa sighed again. 

“I suppose...” she said before laughing unsteadily, “It... When we fled from the building, the men Zack stopped from killing us. I know who the man who lead them is.” Aerith felt it almost like a kick in the guts now. Did Tifa know Cloud?! Tifa listlessly stared towards the window. “He came to visit me when we were imprisoned... His name is Cloud Strife... he's from my home village, one of my childhood friends.” Oh snap... it was her! This was the girl Zack had told Aerith about! What were the odds of that? Gah! Focus! She was currently trying to comfort someone!

“What... what was he like as a kid?” Aerith asked now. That was probably good, right? Tifa sat silent for a few seconds before she said anything. 

“Withdrawn...” she said, “He often... he didn't usually play with the rest of us. Only some times, and it was only when I was alone that he'd come out to play. But then my mom died...” Tifa fell silent for a while now. Aerith wondering where this would lead.

“What happened then?” she asked softly, Tifa not answering initially. “Hey, you can tell me.” Aerith continued after a while. “It's okay, I promise.” 

“I was miserable,” she said, “couldn't understand where she had gone. In the end... I was desperate to see her again. I thought she had gone to Mount Niebel, that if I crossed it I could see her again. It was some old saying, I don't even remember which it was, that I completely misunderstood.” Niebel? For some reason that name sounded familiar to Aerith. She couldn't place it though, being occupied with listening. “My friends came along with me,” Tifa continued, “At least initially. They were scared and in the end they stopped trying to follow me. It was just one of the boys who stuck with me, all the way until we fell down one of the cliffsides.” Aerith winced at this. Planet that must have hurt. Tifa pushed back her hair now, revealing a scar on the side of her neck, right below the hairline behind her ear. 

“I almost died.” she said, “And he got the blame for it. After that he hardly even talked to me. I thought he hated me, I didn't know what to do after that. Father wouldn't believe it was my idea. Then, a few years later Cloud left the village.” Aerith got suspicious now, that was a pretty long skip...

“Do you want to tell me what it was like during those years?” she asked, Tifa sighing again. 

“He was angry, all the time.” she said after a moment of silence. “After a while it didn't go a week without him getting into fights. In the end, most of the village acted like he wasn't even there. I only talked with him a few times, it was always like there was so much I couldn't tell him...” her voice broke a bit now. Aerith reached out and put a hand on her shoulder and Tifa sniffled continuing after a few moments. 

“When he left, he called me out to the water tower.” she said, “He told me that he was going to Midgar. A lot of the boys in town were going there, but he said he was different. He was going to try out for Soldier, like the great Sephiroth.” Aerith thought back of the meeting up at the top floor of the Shinra building, the man Zack had called Sephiroth. The whole meeting had made Aerith unsettled, the insanity reeked from the man and his eyes had made her shiver in disgust and fear equally much. It was hard to think of him as a former hero, but judging from what Tifa said, he must have had been once. Aerith didn't get it, she couldn't see that man as anything other than a terrifying madman. Tifa continued her story after a second, Aerith getting off that trail of thinking to focus again. 

“We made a promise,” she whispered, “if I ever was in trouble he'd come and save me.” Aerith flinched at this, realizing what a mess those whole thing was. Now Tifa laughed weakly, unsteadily. “I thought it'd help him.” she said with a broken voice, “That it could help him focus, give him something more to fight for.” Sobs came from the girl now and Aerith acted instantly. She reached in, immediately giving Tifa a hug to help her calm down. Whispering whatever words she could think of to comfort her, Aerith eventually felt Tifa reach up to wrap one arm around her as well. Aerith thought of what she was going to say, was there anything she could do to help the girl who currently sobbed onto her shoulder. 

“But hey.” she said after a while, not thinking of anything better “You came to Midgar after a while, right? Why was that?” she nearly wanted to hit herself when done, realizing she was dragging it on in the same bloody direction. Tifa took the bait however, calming down after a while. 

“...I...” she began after a while, “I went to Midgar a few years after Cloud had left. Niebelheim was more or less a dead town. I worked as a tour guide for a while, but it didn't work out. I didn't want to be a burden to father and he refused to let me work at the reactor. In the end, if I wanted to make my own living, I had to go to the city.”

“I see.” Aerith said, happy to be away from that subject. Tifa nodded. 

“Also... I kind of hoped to find out about Cloud.” she continued, Aerith flinching, back onto this track... “I used to watch the news all the time, hoping to hear about Cloud. I was certain he'd succeed and become a Soldier, but I never even heard anything. There was lots about Sephiroth, then after a while more about Zack. But nothing about Cloud... ever.” 

“So how'd it go?” Aerith asked. 

“I ended up in the slums.” she said, “Working as a waitress at Seventh Heaven. After a while, this man told me he was a hacker and could help me find the Shinra employee registers. I had tried to ask Shinra personally but they threw me out. All he wanted was for me to smuggle a package to a friend of his past some guard posts.” Tifa shrugged, “I didn't know he was with Avalanche and it seemed like my only lead. I did it, got the files, but Cloud's name wasn't anywhere in the files. The man told me that Shinra had a high mortality rate for Soldier recruits that they kept secret. I didn't know what else to make of it, Cloud was nowhere to be found and the man told me he was dead. It was then I began to hate Shinra. They had caused Cloud's death I thought, without even giving his body back to his family. That man told me of all the other things they did and in the end, I joined up with Avalanche... and then... oh heavens... I sat in that cell after being captured, and that officer comes into the room, takes off his helmet... and it was Cloud...” Now Tifa started sobbing again. 

“He was so cold,” she said after a while, “it was like he didn't even care who I was. He told me he could get me out of there, he'd even give me Marlene to take care of, but only if I betrayed Avalanche.” Aerith felt it like a kick in the guts now, anger welling up inside her. Of all the possible things she could imagine Cloud to do, that was not one of them. To try to use that girl, that sweet little girl Barret called his daughter, to blackmail Tifa. Aerith suddenly couldn't see any of the sweet Cloud, a nice guy wouldn't do something like that. That bastard! Holding onto Tifa, Aerith tried to comfort her even as she wanted to suddenly explode in diatribes against the bastard who had done this to the poor girl. 

\------xxxxxx------

In the depths of the massive Junon naval base beeps, whirrs and the occasional crackle of electricity filled the air along with soft murmurs and the mako-green glow of the vats. Inside the large laboratory over three dozen white-coated scientists and assistants stood, speaking in hushed tones to each other, nearly all their attention was focused the large vat in the middle of the room in which a naked body was floating with dozens of wires and tubes connected to it. Liquids of different kinds were running to or indeed even from him in said tubes. From a raised platform at the end of the room professor Hojo watched the entire scene with a focused look on his face 

“The time is 09:45 hours and project Ascension will now commence.” he said after making some last calculations. “Administer the first dosages.” Down by one of the computer panels a young woman began to push down a row of glowing red buttons, a beep accompanying each push as dark green liquids began to slowly run through several of the smaller wires and into the floating figure's body. The dark liquid could be seen travelling through his veins, being visible even through the skin.

“First dosages administered.” an older woman said from her position by a glowing control board. Her eyes danced over the board, checking countless dials and meters “subject is stable. Values are green across the board. Shall we proceed?” 

“No.” Hojo said, “Let it reach his heart first.” A sudden twitch of the figure inside the tank made most people inside the room tense, the body began to shake, almost thrash, as the spasms tore through his body. “Status?” Hojo asked, unperturbed by the sight. 

“Heart rate is rapidly climbing,” the older woman said, “Approaching two hundred... past two hundred and still climbing. Body temperature approaching lethal levels, EEG is swerving wildly, his lymphatic system is shutting down... Pulse has settled around 270 bpm.”

“Administer 600 ccs of X-22!” Hojo ordered and his commands were instantly obeyed. Red liquid started to be pumped into the body and soon the beeping sound began to abate. Some of the younger scientists took breaths of relief, something that Hojo regarded with contempt. “Proceed to stage two.” he ordered, one of the scientists looking at him now. 

“The specimen is still heavily strained.” he said, “If we proceed instantly there will be a risk...”

“Do you not think I know something that simple?” Hojo asked acerbically and making the man flinch. “We've got one month to make this specimen equal in strength to Sephiroth himself. Besides... this specimen won't break easily.” he added with a smirk. “Proceed with the inoculations!” he snapped, none of the others disobeying this time. Looking at the body floating inside the large vat, Hojo couldn't stop smiling to himself. 

“You'll become perfect, mister Strife...” he muttered, “With you, I will trump the legacy of that fool Gast.” a dark chuckle came from his lips, a hacking, nasal sound sickening in its dark glee. As the man floating inside the tank was inoculated with chemical after chemical Hojo only cackled, his laughter filling the dark chamber. 

\------xxxxxx------

Aerith's entire body hurt. After days of travelling, whether it be getting lifts from helpful truck drivers, slogging across endless plains, wading through knee-deep swamps (she still stunk like an outhouse!) or hiking through long mountain caves, she was so sick of travelling as was humanly possible. They had been on the road for two weeks now almost, journeying what according to Aerith's estimates must have been across half the bloody continent! It hadn't even been a nice view most of the time, just wind-swept plains, swamps and caves. Aerith felt like she was ready to kill for a nice, green forest or something. 

Her boyfriend had been steadily walking next to her, the sweetie offering every bit of support he could. Despite his funk he hadn't showed any more anger or sadness after that time in Kalm, at least not outwardly. Aerith could tell though. Like Tifa and Barret, he was just keeping his sadness under wraps to focus on the present, something that Yuffie still hadn't gotten. At all. The ninja girl had been steadily ignored by the rest of the group for days on end due to her insensitive and flippant comments about Shinra and especially the “spiky haired elite mook jerk” as she called Cloud. The entire thing rendered the seemingly endless journey into a little corner of hell. 

Yet, even this hellscape seemed to be coming to some kinda end. They had for the latest three days been steadily walking towards a large, lonely cliff with some kind of building on it standing in the distance, far from any other mountain yet surrounded by ravines, crags and giant rocks. The sounds of distant vehicles had made them having to sneak for the latest hours, more than one time a helicopter came roaring overhead and forced them to hide. As it was, she was dirty, smelled like a dog, tired, hungry and miserable. The tension all around her didn't help either, not at all. Aerith wondered just how much of a loony she had become when the armed men who seemed to come out of the woodwork around them turned out to be actually a relief for the situation. 

Yeah, out of nowhere they came. Aerith startled and Zack's sword came out in one instant when over a dozen men suddenly were standing all around them. The men that appeared wore brown-grey camouflage clothes, had the lowers halves of their faces covered with brown pieces of cloth and wore another piece as a bandana over their hair. Oh yeah, and they also carried some pretty darn big-ass guns which all were aimed at her and the others. 

“Freeze.” the command cracked like a whip through the air and Tifa, Yuffie and Barret all stopped, raising their hands. Zack was too wound up by it however and kept his hands on his sword at first. The armed men all narrowed their eyes now, levering their guns at him instantly. 

“Hey, hey.” Aerith hissed, “Drop the sword!” She was startled pretty badly but managed to get what was going on enough that she could try to rein in Zack somewhat. She didn't want him shot and these guys didn't look happy. Now Barret intervened however, the burly man lowered his arms and spoke up. 

“Lower your guns.” The man said. “I'm Barret Wallace, leader of the Midgar cell.” the reaction was instant however, the men lowered their weapons and one of them stepped out. 

“Commander Wallace.” the man said, “We were expecting you, the Soldier, not so much.”

“S'okay.” Barret said “This guy's rogue. He's with us now.” Aerith was relieved that the men weren't all with the “pointing of guns at them”-thing anymore but less so when Zack flinched at the mention of that word, “rogue”. She wasn't gonna complain though, just give Zack a few more hugs and get somewhere warmer. Preferably to a place with a bath or something. Yeah a bath would be awesome, that and some new clothes. At the moment she was ready to wear anything as long as it didn't reek of mud and swamp. The man who had spoken amongst the gun-toters looked at the others. 

“The leader wants to see you.” he said, “Your lieutenants can come. The Soldier and the girl stays here for the moment however.” Now Aerith blinked in surprised. What the... oh no they didn't! Barret however intervened on her behalf, the giant lunk steadily moving up on her list of awesome people.

“Fuck that, they're comin' with me.” he said, staring down the speaker. 

“That's not your call to make, commander.” the man said calm as ice. 

“It fuckin' is!” Barret snapped, “This girl's th' Ancient an' the guy's th' only reason she's with us now instead of in Shinra's hands.” At this point the men all around them, who up until then had been cool as a set of heavily armed cucumbers, became about as surprised as she ever had seen anyone. Several of them took a step back in fright, many of them gasped, their statue-like demeanour vanished and was replaced with shock, awe and even fear. 

“She... this woman is...” the leader of the men around them stuttered, his eyes wide and his gun actually almost dropping from his hands. After a few seconds however, after his brain had finished rebooting and installing the new software he acted once more. “Men!” he commanded, “Form up, we're escorting her holiness to the leader!” Picking up his weapon more properly, he made a salute with his free hand towards Barret. “Sir, we'll see you safely to the generator.” Barret nodded, not cracking any smile or anything. Aerith had her hands full however with not doing that. It seemed her status as Ancient could produce some pretty awesome results. When the man turned to salute her, however, she almost exploded into giggles. 

“Your holiness.” the man said stiffly, “I beg forgiveness for my ignorance. We were not aware of your existence. I swear we will see you to safety.” Aerith had this massive glee bubbling up inside her but played it cool, even though it had been the hardest thing she had ever done. This was the best! She collected herself and gave him a small curtsey, trying to look as regal as possible. With only a few short memories from what she had seen on TV and some of the more elegant hostesses at don Corneo's clubs to go on how you looked regal it probably didn't look that good. 

“I am thankful for your concern.” she said, pushing her voice down half an octave or so. “The journey here has been trying and it is good to be amongst friends and good hospitality.” Zack looked funnily at her now and Aerith had to bite down on her lip to not giggle. Planet this was hard! The leader of the armed men blinked at this before turning around and taking up a walkie-talkie. 

“Come in Base, this is Wraith one,” he hissed under his breath, “We're returning to base at this time. I want a bath and new clothes ready when we arrive... Yes, bath, and, new, clothes! Female clothes! The best you can find... No I'm not a crossdresser! Just get it done or I will stab you! Over and out!” With that, he pocketed the walkie-talkie and turned towards them again giving another salute. 

“We can move whenever you're able sir, your holiness.” he said tersely, Aerith once again struggling to stop herself from giggling like a loon. Win! The men spread out now, taking up positions around them, and Aerith nodded towards him. 

“Please, show us the way good sir.” she said, the man saluting yet again and turning around. 

“Move!” he said to the men, the group beginning to move towards the reactor. Aerith kept her mouth tightly shut for fear that she might start giggling still and Zack looked at her as if she had spouted a second head. While she had felt like crap initially, this last bit of the way now seemed to become some of the funniest things she had done. 

\------xxxxxx------

When they reached the large reactor everything seemed to go very, very fast. After the endless trudging towards it the chaos of activity that broke out when they came there seemed frantic. They were met by different people, Tifa and Yuffie being taken away by a pair of young women, Barret following the masked leader of those wraith people while she and Zack had been met by some older woman that seemed like the very spitting image of every grandmother that had ever existed. Zack and Aerith were shown deeper into the tunnels in which Avalanche seemed to hang out, there were people like everywhere. In the end, they came into a room kind of off to the side. It wasn't that fancy, in fact it made her think of giant mole tunnels more than a real home. The walls seemed mostly packed earth, heavy wood beams criss-crossed its roof and walls and the light was pretty dim. However it had something that made Aerith's eyes water. A large bathtub, a table with food on it, new clothes that were more expensive than anything she had worn, Aerith almost squealed.

“If there is anything you need, let me know your holiness.” the old woman said and Aerith nodded eagerly. 

“Got it.” she said before heading straight for the bath. However, on the way she realized something and turned to the table. Grabbing the large bowl of food, she brought it to the bathtub and quickly undressed, getting into the bath with the large bowl next to her on a table. 

“You're a loonie.” Zack said from his position by the table. Her boyfriend had put his sword against the wall and sat down to take off his boots. He was currently checking his bare feet but had looked up to smile at her. Aerith only grinned at him. 

“I've always wanted to do this.” she said, taking up the chopsticks and eagerly slurping down some of the noodle wok in the bowl. “Oh planet...” she said now, almost gasping. “This is great!” the girl exclaimed and began to even more eagerly scarf down the contents of the bowl. “Seriously, this... how do you get meat to taste this good?!” she asked the old lady with wide eyes. The old lady smiled in a saintly way. 

“Marinade.” she said, Aerith absently nodding as she kept devouring the bowl, alternating between chewing down the food and cleaning herself. It was the first time Aerith had been able to indulge in this kind of... well hedonism she supposed was the word, all the stuff she enjoyed at the same time. Or well, almost all of it. Having rinsed through her hair properly and finished the bowl, she looked around the room. 

“Is there a bed somewhere here?” she asked now, feeling how the weariness set in. Planet damn it she was pretty much knackered. The old woman nodded and walked over to a curtain hanging across one wall. Pulling it back however, she revealed a large bed behind it and Aerith smiled. Damn she was tired. Within a minute she had gotten out of the bath, toweled off crept into a pyjama that had been made ready for her and gotten into the bed. She was overjoyed that it finally was over, while she didn't rightly know what would come, now at least she felt great, felt full and most of all, felt tired enough that she fell asleep within seconds.


End file.
